Secrets
by Sophia Hawkins
Summary: AU crossover with Law & Order: SVU. A Chicago firefighter is found beaten and raped in a vacant lot in New York and it's up to the detectives of Manhattan Special Victims Unit to find who is behind the attack; but the deeper they dig into the investigation, they're left with more questions than answers.
1. Chapter 1

A/N: A few things about this story before you begin. This is a crossover story with Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, and I am aware there is a crossover section for these two shows, but given there are only three stories submitted in it, I thought I'd have better luck of people actually seeing it in the main Chicago Fire section. There is basically no canon timeline here since it features the original SVU crew: Olivia Benson, Elliot Stabler, Odafin Tutuola and John Munch, a dynamic that was broken up or nearing that point when the Chicago shows first aired on TV. Some chronological details of when certain events happened on Fire may be out of order since there's no actual timeline to follow for the purpose of this story. Hope you all enjoy, please read and review. This first chapter is short since I wanted it to start off with a traditional Law & Order type of opening.

Secrets

The 20-something blonde jogger breathed heavily as she ran through the dark street with only the streetlights to see by, calling to the guy behind her, "Hurry up, Mike!"

"Slow down, Cynthia," her husband replied as he huffed and puffed, struggling to keep up with her.

She turned on her heel and watched her dark haired husband finally catch up to her, the orangish hue from the street lamps overhead showing his jogging clothes were stuck to him with sweat.

"We got two more miles to go," she told him.

"Why don't we switch gears and just walk home?" he asked. "It's still 90 degrees out, people die this way."

"Don't be such a big baby," Cynthia said as she turned to the front and wordlessly compromised by shifting down to a speed walk.

"If we gotta get in shape, why don't we just join a gym? At least they got air conditioning," he said as he walked alongside her.

"We did join one, three years ago, you never went after the first time," she reminded him. "Good money wasted."

"What do you suppose the cost for hospitalization due to heat stroke is?" he replied.

Their conversation was suddenly broken up by a sudden noise from nearby, they both stopped and looked around.

"What was that?" she asked.

"I don't know," he answered.

They heard another noise, metal trash cans being turned over, something of that sort, and it was coming from just a few yards down the block.

"Come on," the man said as he took the lead.

Now his wife wasn't so sure. "Mike, be careful."

He stepped up on the curb and saw something sprawled over the sidewalk beside an empty lot. Advancing cautiously, he watched for any signs of movement, and jumped back when he heard the sound of somebody moaning and saw something move in the dark. He was just barely able to make out the sight of an outstretched arm sticking out past the trashcans.

"Oh my God!" he exclaimed as he about knocked his wife down running into her. He turned to her and told her, "Call 911!" He looked back and he could more distinctly see the outline of a person, a man, who had slowly rolled over on his back, and could still be heard moaning faintly.

* * *

"What've we got?" Elliot Stabler asked as he and Olivia Benson crouched under the crime scene tape to assess the situation.

A uniform cop on the scene motioned towards the vic on the gurney that the paramedics were getting ready to load in the ambulance and rush to Mercy General, "White male, mid 30s, found by a couple out for a late jog, no ID, no phone, no clothes. Lacerations, contusions, looks like somebody bashed his head in."

"Any signs of rape?" Olivia asked.

"Blood and fluids, and more behind those trash cans, looks like this is where the attack went down," the uni answered.

"Okay, canvass the area, check every trash can, every dumpster, odds are the perp tossed his stuff somewhere close by when he made his getaway," Elliot told him.

"Check for any surveillance cameras," Olivia added, "somebody somewhere had to have heard or seen something."

"On it."

"Did he say anything?" Elliot asked another uni.

"He's barely conscious," he responded, "doubt the paramedics got anything either."

"Okay, so, guy's out here, why?" Elliot asked.

"This isn't heavy drug traffic neighborhood," Olivia said. "Probably wasn't buying or dealing."

"Have to wait for a tox screen to find out if he was using," Elliot said. "Not a lot of cars parked around here, either nobody's home or everybody's in bed, street's pretty empty right now. The people that found him were out for a jog, maybe he was getting some exercise too."

"Detectives," one of the women with CSU stood up and told them, "got more than one semen sample over here."

Olivia and Elliot headed over to take a look.

"Based on the smudges on the ground, I'd say this is where the vic was positioned," she told them, "and as you can see..."

"The stains are on both sides of the vic," Elliot said.

"So either he was raped more than once," Olivia said.

"Or by more than one person," Elliot added. "_Or_...it's the vic's."

Olivia shook her head, "Those are always the hardest ones to get the victim to press charges. Still takes us back to the original question, _what_ was he doing out here?"

"Detectives," a uniform cop came up to the scene, "we found a phone and a wallet in a dumpster a block away."

"That was almost too easy," Olivia commented.

"Let me see," Elliot said as he took the wallet. He opened it up and grimaced. "Damn it."

"What?" Olivia asked.

"Guy's got a shield."

"He's a cop?" Olivia asked in disbelief.

"No," Elliot turned it over and showed her the badge and the driver's license. "Matthew Casey of the Chicago Fire Department."

Olivia tried to take this information in but wasn't sure what to make of it. "Guy's a long way from home, what was he doing in Manhattan?"

Elliot looked through the wallet and said, "Cash is still here, about $500, got an ATM card, got a credit card...so robbery definitely wasn't on the menu."

"Looks like the perp tried to smash the phone but only cracked the screen," the uni told them.

Olivia took the phone and on the screen, through the spiderweb cracks, she and Elliot were able to make out a picture of the vic standing beside and with his arm draped over the shoulders of a man of slightly larger build with tanned skin and short dark hair that was prematurely graying in parts.

"He's gay?" Olivia asked.

"Maybe he was out here getting a different _kind_ of exercise," Elliot thought.


	2. Chapter 2

"So where are we?" Cragen asked his detectives.

"The victim is Matt Casey, 35 years old, lives in Chicago, there's no way of knowing _what_ he's doing in New York," Olivia said. "the rape kit collected blood, semen and hairs..."

"Canvass found a set of clothes in a dumpster two blocks away that _could_ be the vic's but we can't find anybody who saw him that night who could verify what he was wearing, they're also being sent to the lab," Elliot added.

"He's still unconscious," Olivia explained, "docs found evidence of an old, healed skull fracture. Turns out if the perp had bashed the other side of his head in, he'd already be dead."

"Not much of a lucky break but better than nothing I suppose," Munch commented as he headed over to his desk.

"TARU get anything on the phone recovered at the scene?" Cragen asked.

"They are backed up on the phones taken off the 50 members of that pedophile ring we busted last week," Elliot answered, "All of them have encrypted material on them that they're having a hard time breaking through. They told us they'll get to it when they can."

"And in the meantime we have no contact info for anybody who knows this guy?" Donald wanted to know.

"No emergency contact listed," Olivia said.

"Well my brother-in-law used to be a volunteer firefighter and I remember they rotated shifts every 24 hours, so either this guy got a furlough to leave town, or whatever firehouse he belongs to is going to realize he's missing soon," Cragen told the detectives.

"So maybe one of them knows he was coming to New York," Fin said, "but we got no way to contact them."

"Not unless you want to Google the phone number for every firehouse in the Windy City and ask them if they're missing a man," Munch commented.

"Well he had to get here somehow, show his picture to all the cab companies, rental car companies, somebody had to see this guy," Cragen told his detectives.

Elliot looked at Olivia's desk and saw she appeared to be deep in thought.

"Liv."

"Huh?" she looked up.

"What're you thinking?"

She rapped her knuckles against the desk a couple of times and answered, "Sergeant Voight."

"Chicago's a big city, Liv," Elliot pointed out.

"He's the only contact we have there, if he doesn't know this guy he can probably at least find out something about him," Olivia said.

"You want to get that hothead involved in our investigation?" he asked. After a brief pause he said in a tone signifying approval, "Okay, call the bastard."

Instead of calling from her desk phone, Olivia got up, headed into the women's rest room and called on her cell phone.

"Olivia?" she recognized the cop's raspy voice.

"Sergeant Voight," she replied.

"Ah, guessing this isn't a personal call," Voight said.

"Actually I need your help on a case we have."

"Another serial killer?"

"No, we have a victim in the hospital here who was found with a wallet identifying him as a firefighter from Chicago."

"Matt Casey?"

Olivia blinked. "You know him."

"It's a long story. He's been missing for a couple days, what happened?" Voight wanted to know.

"We're not really sure yet. He was found in an empty lot tonight, beaten, raped, stripped, he's unconscious right now, the doctors aren't sure when he's going to come out of it," Olivia explained. There was silence on the other end of the line and Olivia could just picture the Intelligence sergeant taking in this bombshell. Finally she asked him, "Do you know how we can contact his family?"

"He has no family," Hank answered. "I'm on the next flight out."

Olivia could just imagine how well this was not going to go over with Cragen, but she nodded and told him, "We'll see you then. I'll let you know if there's an update. One question, do you have any idea what he was doing in Manhattan?"

"Matt Casey doesn't know _anybody_ in New York," Hank told her.

* * *

"So Voight actually _knows_ this guy?" Elliot asked when she returned to the squad room.

"He didn't really go into details, but he was very definite that Matt doesn't know anyone in New York so I'm taking that as they have some kind of history, and Hank's just as clueless as we are why he was out here," Olivia said.

"Good call," Elliot commented.

"He's catching the next plane out, so he should be here in about 4 hours," she told him.

"And we'll probably still be right where we are now," Elliot said.

"Maybe not," Fin said as he hung up his phone. "Hospital called, victim's awake."

* * *

"Matt Casey is conscious, and he's lucid, but his memory is shoddy," the doctor explained to the SVU detectives before they went in. "I don't know what he'll be able to tell you, if anything, and I don't know if it's temporary, or if the blow to the head caused permanent damage."

"But he can talk to us?" Elliot asked.

"You're welcome to try, but don't be surprised if he can't answer your questions, and don't overexert him, we have to keep him closely monitored," she said.

"Okay, thank you," Olivia said.

They entered the hospital room and took in the sight of the battered blonde man laying in the bed, his eyes half open, looking like he was about to fall asleep.

"Matt Casey?"

The fireman softly groaned and forced his eyes open at the sound of his name. Olivia and Elliot showed their badges. "I'm Detective Benson, this is Detective Stabler, we'd like to ask you a few questions. Do you know where you are?"

He squeezed his eyes all but shut but they could see him looking around the room. "...hospital?"

"Do you know what state you're in?" Olivia asked.

His eyes roamed again, but he just softly moaned and barely shook his head.

"Do you know what happened to you tonight?"

He closed his eyes and shielded them with his hand and just shook his head again.

"Can you tell us what you do remember?" Elliot asked.

Matt's face grimaced in pain and he weakly croaked out, "Head...head...my head's ki-"

That's where he stopped, and both detectives were concerned.

"Matt?" Elliot asked.

The blonde man dropped his hand and his eyes were open, then his body went into convulsions and the monitors he was hooked up to started beeping and screaming. The doctor came running in with three other medical staff.

"What's going on?" Olivia asked.

"I'm going to need you to step outside right now," the doctor told them as they were quickly ushered out the door and the curtain was drawn.

* * *

"No, Captain, nobody's told us anything yet and it's been almost two hours," Olivia said as she glanced at the clock on the wall. "Uh huh...yeah got it, okay." She disconnected the call and told Elliot, "He said if they're not talking yet, to leave them our card and head back to the station."

Even Elliot was shaking his head, "This is so messed up, guy comes halfway across the country, nobody knows why, he's probably dying and there's nobody to get him."

Olivia nudged him when she saw the doctor heading their way.

"Well?"

"He's stable for now," she said.

"What happened?" Elliot asked.

"Matt Casey has a subdural hematoma, we're monitoring it right now to determine if he'll need surgery," she answered.

"How'd you miss that?" Elliot asked.

"Our MRI scanner was broken, so we did a CT scan, they're not as accurate to pick up subdural hematomas," the doctor explained, letting them know that she was just as frustrated by this snafu as they were.

"Will you let us know when there's an update?" Olivia asked.

She nodded, "Yes."

"Thank you."


	3. Chapter 3

"Uh oh, hide your wallets," Fin said as the detectives spotted Hank Voight entering the squad room.

The Intelligence sergeant managed an expression that wasn't a smile but was amiable enough as he replied, "Good to see you too, Detective Tutuola."

"Thanks for coming, Hank," Olivia stood up from her desk, "I wish we had better news."

"What happened?"

"Docs found a subdural hematoma, Matt might be going into surgery," Elliot said, "doc said she'd keep us posted."

Voight's face hardened and his eyes closed for a split second, "God..."

"He was briefly conscious, but couldn't answer any questions," Elliot said.

"What've you got?" Hank asked.

"Not much," Olivia confessed, "we were hoping you could help us fill in some blanks about him."

"Well first of all, Matt Casey is a lieutenant at Firehouse 51, with an extensive work family who all want to know what the hell happened to him," Voight addressed all the detectives.

"How do you know him?" Munch thought to ask.

"That's a long story," Voight said.

"Are you close?" Olivia asked.

Voight shook his head, "No."

"Then why'd you come out here?" Elliot asked.

"Because right now nobody at 51 needs to know what he's been put through," Voight answered. He looked at Olivia again and said as if he was having trouble with the concept, "Now let me make sure I heard this right...you said he was _raped_?"

She nodded. "Hospital rape kit collected blood, fluids, fibers, and a couple hairs...we're still waiting for the results...and I have to tell you Hank, when he was found, CSU found several semen samples...we can't rule anybody out yet, there's a possibility that one of them could be Matt's."

Voight's jaw tightened on one side of his face as he told her, "That's gonna be rough for him."

"Can you think of _any_ reason he would come out here without telling anyone?" Elliot asked.

Hank shook his head. "No, nobody can."

"His phone was found in a dumpster but it's going to be a while before we know if there's anything on it that can help us," Olivia said. "You said Matt doesn't have any family?"

"None close, an estranged sister and his mother who was in prison for 15 years for killing his father," Hank explained.

"Now _that's_ rough," Elliot said.

"Does he have a partner?" Olivia asked.

"No, they don't do that in the fire department, he's got a whole company of men working under him," Hank told her.

She shook her head, "No, I mean does Matt have a boyfriend?"

"A-what? Voight asked after a brief pause, and his eyes notably wider in confusion.

"Before TARU got his phone we found a picture on it of him and another guy," Elliot said. "They looked fairly close."

"That would be Kelly Severide, the Rescue Squad lieutenant at 51," Hank told them. "And no, whatever you're thinking is _way_ off. They're both straight and they've got the track records to prove it...Severide _especially_, he sleeps with every woman he meets."

"And Matt?"

"He had a fiancee, she was murdered a year ago, I worked the case," Voight said.

There was a grim silence in the room as the detectives took in that piece of information.

"Okay, so, how well would you say you know him?" Elliot asked.

"Like I said, we're not close," Hank said.

"But you _know_ he's straight?"

Voight leaned forward and closed part of the gap between he and Elliot and said, "If you're trying to imply something, Detective Stabler, feel free to come out with it."

Elliot didn't appreciate the attitude but he calmly pointed out the question in his mind, "Is it possible Matt Casey came here to hook up with a guy and he just didn't want anyone back home knowing about it?"

Voight moved back and turned to Olivia with a look on his face that said the same thing he did a second later. "Is he serious?"

"We have to consider all possibilities until we can rule them out, Hank," Olivia said. "He didn't tell _anyone_ where he was going?"

"No," Voight answered. "Apparently he'd told the guys at work he was going to be visiting his mother over the weekend. Yesterday, Kelly Severide ran into his mother, who said she hadn't seen or heard from him for a month...checked his apartment, he wasn't there, his truck wasn't there, we found that at the airport, nobody has heard a word from him since they got off last shift. He was supposed to be back at work first thing tomorrow morning."

"Well he came out here for a reason," Olivia said, "but nobody knows what it is, and so far we haven't been able to find anyone who remembers seeing him."

"What hospital is he in?" Voight asked.

"Mercy General."

"You lead the way," he said.

Olivia and Elliot glanced at each other, then she looked back at him, "Hank-"

"I want to see him," Voight told them, "I want to see what they did to him."

* * *

The three cops stood at the window looking in to Casey's room and watched the unconscious man laying in the bed.

"My God," Voight said.

Olivia turned and looked at him and couldn't help commenting, "You seem very involved for somebody who admittedly isn't close to the victim."

Voight continued staring in through the window and said simply, "We have history."

"What kind?" Elliot asked.

"Not great," Hank answered. "Matt Casey was the only witness willing to testify that my son, Justin, was drunk when he crashed into another car and paralyzed a 16 year old kid. I tried to get him to retract his statement, he refused, I broke a few rules, he knocked me on my ass...the people who now work for _me_, busted me in a sting and put me in jail for trying to kill him."

That quickly grabbed the attention of the two SVU detectives who looked at him wide eyed.

"Seriously?" Elliot asked.

"You're a father, what would you do to protect your kids?" Hank replied. "Cop's kid in prison, you know how that's going to turn out. I know I crossed the line, when I got released, I tried to apologize, that didn't go over so well."

"I don't blame him, I wouldn't accept it," Elliot said.

That got half of a smirk from the Intelligence sergeant.

"Is that why you investigated his fiancee's murder?" Olivia asked.

"Hallie was a strong woman, she withstood all my crap without blinking...she didn't deserve what happened to her, neither did Casey. I didn't have any expectations that catching her killer would fix things between us...my people have had to team up with his people a few times to catch criminals...we have a working relationship but that's about as far as it goes."

"But you're here now," Olivia pointed out again.

Voight continued to gaze in the window. "What the docs say?"

"He was brutalized, sodomized, beaten, bludgeoned, his money, credit cards and phone were tossed in a dumpster, whoever did this to him never intended to rob him, they just wanted to torture and kill him," Elliot answered.

Hank didn't visibly react to any of the details, but he said, "Casey didn't deserve this either. If he dies and I gotta go back to Chicago and tell the guys at 51...I want the people responsible and I want their heads mounted over my fireplace."

"And everybody in this city's trying to take _my_ badge for being too violent," Elliot cynically commented.

"You guys head on back, I'll stay here a while," Voight said.

"There's nothing you can do, Hank," Olivia said.

"If he wakes up _somebody_ should be with him..." Voight turned to the two detectives, "And if he wakes up, he is _not_ going to talk about what happened to him with you," he pointed to Olivia, "and especially not to you," he told Elliot.

"You think he'd tell you?" Olivia asked.

"No," Voight answered. "But he will _talk_ to me...somebody should be with him he knows."

The two SVU detectives looked at each other and considered their options. Finally Olivia looked at him and said, "Let us know if anything changes."

They left, and after a minute Voight headed into the hospital room and sat down in the chair next to Casey's bed. He watched the younger man breathing, there was no indication he was aware of a presence in the room. Hank reached over and grabbed Casey's hand and said rhetorically, "Who hurt you, Casey?"

* * *

"Liv...Liv!"

Olivia's eyes flew open as she shot up in bed and it was a few seconds before she realized they were in the crib and sun was pouring in the windows. Elliot stood beside her bunk and looked down at her.

"What time is it?" she asked as she tried to bring herself around.

"8 A.M., we gotta get to Mercy General."

"What's wrong?" she was already dreading the worst news possible.

"Casey's awake again," Elliot told her.

She looked up at him and did a double take, "What?"

"Docs said apparently the hematoma dissolved itself...I don't know, but he's awake now and he's _definitely_ lucid now."

It took a couple seconds for Olivia's brain to figure out what Elliot was saying, then she jumped out of the bed. "Let's go!"


	4. Chapter 4

"Did he say anything to you?" Elliot asked Hank as they headed towards Casey's hospital room.

"Something about waking up in hell since I was there, but other than that, not much," Hank told them. "He knows what happened to him and he's already defensive. You can try questioning him, I'm going to hang back and see what happens."

"Thanks," Olivia said as they headed for the door.

They entered the room and saw Matt Casey sitting up in the bed, eyes wide open now and looking not thrilled whatsoever to be there.

"Matt Casey, do you remember us?"

"No," he answered, "sorry."

"Okay, we'll go through the introductions again," Elliot said as they showed their badges, "Detective Elliot Stabler, Detective Olivia Benson. Do you know where you are?"

"The hospital."

"Do you know which hospital?"

"Nope," he answered.

"Do you know what city you're in?" Olivia asked.

"...Manhattan," he said after a slight hesitation.

"Can you tell us what happened to you?" Elliot asked.

"Nope, sorry," Casey said a little too quickly to be convincing.

"Okay, Matt, we know you were assaulted," Olivia said, "and I know that you're feeling embarrassed and ashamed at what happened-"

"I don't know what you're talking about," Matt told them, "I just want to get out of here."

"What're you doing in New York?" Elliot asked.

Casey was silent for a second, then shrugged and said, "I can't remember."

"If you're protecting someone, you need to tell us, we can help you," Elliot told him.

"I'm not protecting anyone," Casey insisted, "and I wasn't raped."

"So the sex was consensual."

"I don't know _what_ you're talking about," he said.

"Matt," Olivia told him, "we talked to your doctor, we know about the stitches, they took pictures during the rape kit." They saw his mouth close and his eyes bulge at this newfound information. "Now we need to know who did this to you."

"No."

"And you need to know that if anything happened during your attack, and your body responded in a way you didn't want, that's not your fault," Olivia continued, "it's simply an involuntary muscle response, it doesn't mean-"

"I'm not talking to you, to either of you, now get out and leave me alone," Casey sniped them.

"Matt-"

"_Go away_."

The two cops looked at each other and knew they weren't going to get anywhere.

"Okay," Olivia said as they started to back off. She reached in her pocket and laid her card on the bed table, "If you change your mind, you can reach us at this number."

Casey's response was to roll over on his side with his back to them.

* * *

"Well, that sucked," Olivia said after they left the room.

"Told you," Voight said.

"It's obvious this guy is scared out of his mind about _something_," Elliot noted, "but what?" He turned to Voight, "If he wouldn't back off with you trying to kill him, what would make him clam up now?"

Voight shook his head and shrugged his shoulders. "Wish I knew."

"You said you could get him to talk?" Elliot asked.

"Talk, yeah, actually give us answers, that'll take time," Voight said.

"Well, we're desperate," Olivia said.

"Nice to know," he said cynically.

"See what you can do," Elliot suggested.

They stood back and watched as Voight went into Casey's room this time. Watching through the window they could easily see Casey's discomfort at the cop's presence in the room. They exchanged some words and Voight advanced to Matt's hospital bed, it was obvious from Casey's body language that he still wasn't going to cooperate and he wasn't going to admit to anything, but despite this the conversation kept rolling. Casey turned away from Voight and looked towards the wall, but even then words were exchanged. Finally, Voight reached over and put his hand on Casey's arm, the younger man visibly grimaced under the touch but otherwise made no attempt to pull away. Hank said some final words in parting and left the room and rejoined the detectives in the corridor.

"Well?" Olivia asked.

Hank shook his head, "Won't budge."

"That was worth doing," Elliot dryly commented.

"He won't _admit_ he was raped...but he _said_ he didn't get a look at the guy," Voight said. "Now that's all he's willing to say right now, but he wants to know where he has to go when he gets out of here to get his wallet."

"He'll have to come to our station and sign for it," Olivia answered.

"I'll bring him. In the meantime he's going to need a change of clothes for when he's discharged, I finally got the name of a motel he checked into out of him, he should have a set there," Voight told them.

"Give us the address, we'll check it out," Olivia said.

* * *

"This is depressing," Olivia said as she looked around the scarcely furnished motel room that Matt Casey was registered as staying at. "Don't firemen get paid better than this?"

Elliot found Casey's bag on the bed, unzipped it and looked in. "Couple changes of clothes, razor, deodorant, pretty bare bones stuff, absolutely nothing to indicate what he came out here for, and no indicator he planned staying past the weekend. No condoms, and there were none in his wallet."

Olivia headed out the door and asked the desk clerk, "Did he say anything about why he was here?"

"No ma'am, and it's not our business to ask, you lose customers that way."

"Did he bring anybody else to this room?" Elliot questioned.

"If he had there would've been an additional charge for two customers."

"And were there?"

"No."

"Did he ask about any services?" Olivia asked, "Or directions to any place?"

"He asked if there were any good restaurants in the area, I gave him a couple names."

* * *

"Whatever Matt Casey was doing in New York, he never went anywhere to eat," Elliot said back at the squad room, "we checked the restaurants the motel clerk listed, nobody ever saw him, we checked the other places in the same area, nothing. Now he was in New York 2 days and he was only attacked on the second day, so where the hell's he been all this time?"

"I don't suppose he offered anything," Cragen said.

"He is adamant that nothing happened, he wasn't raped, he didn't have sex with anybody, and he's not talking to us," Olivia told him.

"Well it sounds like our hands are tied then, with no complaining victim and no witnesses we have nothing to go on."

"Captain, somebody got to this guy and terrified him into keeping his mouth shut," Elliot said, "that's coercion, it's intimidation."

"It's impossible to prove without anybody willing to file a complaint or testify in open court," Cragen replied. "Now we have plenty of other cases we can spend our resources on with victims who are able and willing to tell someone what happened to them."

Munch came up and inserted himself into the conversation with his typical forte of cynicism, "'Please excuse our victim's absence, he's too _dead_ to talk'."

"What're you talking about, John?" Donald asked.

"EMS just responded to another scene with another male vic with a similar pattern to our 'no talk'um' case, only this guy didn't live long enough for the paramedics to get to him."

Olivia and Elliot looked at their captain, who didn't make direct eye contact but instead looked ahead at a lower level in his 'I hate this job somedays' expression and told them, "Go."


	5. Chapter 5

"So Casey's not the only victim here," Voight said when Liv and Elliot returned to the hospital.

"26 year old male, raped, beaten, fractured skull, his clothes were found near the body but his wallet and phone were tossed in a dumpster two blocks away, the cash was gone. Turns out he was a male escort returning from a call, it's not an exact match but it's close enough for us to work with. His family is on the way to the morgue to ID the body," Olivia said. "Has Casey said anything else?"

"No."

"Hey!" Elliot looked and through the window to Casey's room they could see someone leaning over the bed who was not one of the hospital staff. "Hey!"

He and Olivia grabbed their guns and charged in. "Police, show us your hands!"

"Whoa!" the man stood up and turned around with his hands high in the air.

Both detectives recognized him as the man from the picture on Matt's phone.

"Kelly Severide?" Elliot asked.

"Yeah, what the hell's going on?" Kelly demanded to know.

The detectives holstered their guns, "What're you doing here?"

"What?" the Squad lieutenant asked, at a total loss.

"Who told you what was going on?" Olivia asked.

"I did," Hank answered as he stepped into the room.

"What?"

"Why?"

Everybody in the room started talking over each other until Voight raised his voice above all others and was yelling at them, "ENOUGH!" when the noise died down he less than subtly said to the detectives, "Can I see you outside?" He turned to the two lieutenants who were both looking at him, very confused at the sudden turn of events, and told them, "Talk among yourselves, I'll be back in a minute."

Both of the firemen were breathing heavily after that sudden fiasco. Kelly turned to the man sitting up in the bed and asked him, "Casey, what the hell is going on around here?"

"I don't know, I just want to get out of here," Matt told him.

"What do the docs say?" Severide asked.

"They want to do another MRI before they discharge me," he said, the frustration clear in his voice, "I want to go home, Kelly."

"I know...what happened? We were all worried about you."

"I didn't mean to worry anyone," Casey said. "I thought I'd be back in time for next shift and nobody would know."

"Know what?" Kelly asked.

* * *

"Why did you call Kelly Severide and tell him what was going on?" Olivia asked Hank out in the hall.

"What happened to nobody at 51 needed to know what happened to Casey?" Elliot asked.

"He needs somebody out here he trusts," Voight said for an answer, "and he doesn't trust me and he's sure as hell not going to trust you two. Severide's his best friend, if anybody can get through to him...it'll be Kelly."

"You think he can get Casey to answer our questions?" Olivia asked.

"I think Severide is going to want the son of a bitch who did this caught just as much as we do," Voight told her. "Now so far nobody else at 51 knows anything except that we've found Casey and he's in the hospital, they don't know why he is, they don't know what happened to him, and we're going to keep it that way until further notice."

"Why didn't you tell us?" she wanted to know.

"What would you have done?" Hank asked.

"Well for starters _not_ busted into a hospital room ready to shoot someone," Elliot stated the obvious. "We thought his rapist came back to finish him off."

"So now what?" Olivia asked.

"Docs aren't gonna release Casey for a couple days, I figure we keep Severide close, maybe we can crack through this shield Casey's got up," Hank answered.

"That'd be a first," Elliot said. "Guys generally don't want anybody knowing they've been raped, it's especially not something they tell their guy friends about."

Voight responded, "I'm hoping by not giving him that option, we can get through to him."

"How did Kelly take the news?" Olivia asked.

"How would you if it was your best friend? He wants this guy dead, and he wants to get Matt home to Chicago," Hank said. "For that matter, so do I...but I know you gotta get him talking first."

"You really think it'll work?" Elliot asked.

"We got the time," Voight pointed out, "why not try it?"

* * *

Voight found Severide in the hospital cafeteria downing a cup of coffee. "How is he?"

Kelly crushed the paper cup and tossed it in the trash can, "He fell asleep a little while ago. He wouldn't tell me anything."

"Not surprising."

"How the hell did this happen, Voight?"

"That's what we're trying to find out," Hank said. "Casey didn't tell you _anything_ about coming here?"

"No, he said his mom got a place in Florida and he was going to head down there and see her this weekend," Kelly answered.

"So back to the original question, what was he doing here that he didn't want anybody at 51 to know about?" Voight wondered as they left the cafeteria and walked down the corridor.

"You think he's in some kind of trouble?" Severide asked.

"If he wasn't at the beginning, he sure got it now," Hank said. "Whatever happened, somebody made it clear to keep his mouth shut."

"So now what?" Kelly asked helplessly.

"All I can say is stay with him, let him know he's not alone, sooner or later he _has_ to start talking," Hank told him.

Kelly was visibly beside himself. "This is so messed up, Hank."

"I know it, that's why I called you, he needs a friend right now or I don't think he's going to get through this."

Kelly's eyes shifted and looked to the side, then back at Hank and asked cluelessly, "What do I do?"

"Start by talking to the detectives."

"Why? I don't know anything."

"I know...but I think you need to hear what they know," Hank told him.

* * *

Kelly sat in an interview room at SVU, Olivia and Elliot sat on the other end of the table facing him.

"Casey didn't tell me anything about coming to New York...I don't know what he was doing here, I don't know what happened to him," he told them.

"We know this is a hard time for Matt, and for you, Kelly," Olivia said. "We understand why he doesn't want to talk with us, it's actually very common for rape victims, especially males, coming forward is generally a lot harder for them because they know people are less inclined to believe them."

"If a woman accuses somebody of rape, it's made out to be a he said/she said, if a guy accuses somebody, if it's a woman they say he just got lucky, and if it was a guy, then everybody assumes he's gay," Elliot said. "Either way he's risking being ridiculed by everyone around him."

Kelly uncomfortably shifted in his chair and pressed his hands together between his knees and glanced down.

"There's another reason he may not want to talk about this," Elliot continued. "We're still waiting on the DNA testing but it's possible that during his attack he became aroused and ejaculated."

Kelly squeezed his eyes shut for a second, then looked at them in disbelief, "What?"

"It's not uncommon, Kelly, it's another reason why so many victims are too embarrassed and ashamed to come forward because they think it looks like they _wanted_ it," Olivia explained. "It's just a purely biological reaction, it doesn't mean anything."

"But defense attorneys are notorious at twisting it to be a sign of consent," Elliot added, "It's the ultimate Catch-22, if he goes public with his attack, he's going to be bombarded by people on all sides who make him out to be a willing participant."

"But if he _doesn't_ press charges, the rapist walks, and is free to do it again to somebody else," Olivia said, "and Matt will never get closure. I've been working at SVU for a long time and I've seen plenty of victims who regret not pressing charges against their attacker, but win or lose, I've never seen one who regrets facing them in open court."

Kelly was visibly growing more and more uncomfortable as the conversation progressed and he looked like his head was going to explode. For the second time that day he found himself helplessly asking, "What do I do?"

"Do you think he would confide in you about his attack?" Olivia asked.

"He hasn't so far...I don't know what to say...I don't know what to do."

His mind reeled back to when he first arrived at the hospital earlier that day.

* * *

Voight had given him Casey's room number and given him most of the details of what had happened so he wouldn't be too surprised when he got there. He'd also advised Severide not to tell anybody else at 51 any details about Casey's attack. He didn't even remember how he'd lasted through the plane ride to New York, he didn't remember getting from the airport to the hospital, he just remembered marching down the hall to Casey's room. He stopped just outside the door and felt the color drain out of his face when he saw Casey lying in the bed. He willed himself not to respond to anything that happened when he was in there, he had to be there for his friend.

He opened the door and stepped in, "Casey."

Matt looked up and saw him, and his face immediately became an expression of disgust and horror. "No! Get out, Kelly...I don't want you to see me like this."

The sheer panic written all over his face was evident as he yelled at Severide to leave the room. But Kelly didn't listen, instead he walked over to the bed and spoke over Casey, telling him, "It's okay, Matt, it's okay, calm down."

"Oh God," Casey groaned, "did Voight call you? What did he tell you?"

"It's alright, Casey," Severide assured him, "I know this wasn't your fault."

Casey's words stopped being coherent and he was frantic with terror at Severide's presence, it took a while but Kelly was finally able to get him to calm down. He leaned over and wrapped his arms around Casey and hugged him and told him, "It's going to be okay, you're safe now."

"Who else knows?" Casey's voice was small, but full of fear at the possibilities.

"Nobody else knows, nobody else will know," Kelly promised him, "it's okay, calm down. Are you in pain? Do you need anything?"

Casey shook his head, "No, I don't need anything, I don't want anything, I just want to get out of here and go home and forget all about this. I didn't want anyone to know, Kelly."

"It's going to be alright, Casey, just take it easy," Kelly told him.

Casey's resistance was starting to wear down and he reluctantly admitted as he clung to his best friend, "I'm glad you're here."

Kelly tightened his hold on Casey and continued to assure him, "It's okay, it's okay, you're alright."

The next thing he'd heard was a voice behind him saying, "Police, show us your hands!"

* * *

"Look, Kelly," Olivia's voice drew him out of his thoughts and back to the here and now, "There's no easy answer, but Matt is luckier than most victims, one thing they often face is a lack of a support system as they recover from their assault. The fact that you came 1,000 miles to be with him _knowing_ what happened to him..."

"It wasn't his fault," Kelly said defensively.

"Nobody's saying it is," Elliot replied. "But a lot of the vics we see, they don't get a lot of help from their family, their friends, they're terrified to let them know, because they think even the people they've known their whole lives won't believe them."

"Sometimes they're right," Olivia said, "and it's our experience that men especially don't want to disclose something like this, _especially_ to their best friends," Olivia added. "Since Matt already knows he has your undivided support, he's better off than most of the people we see on this job. There might not be anything 'right' you can say to him, but just knowing he's not alone and you're not judging him is going to help him tremendously."

"But is it enough?" he asked.

* * *

Voight stood beside Casey's hospital bed and hovered over the blonde man who appeared to be sleeping, but Hank suspected otherwise. Finally Casey opened his eyes and grumbled, "You're a damn vulture, you know that?"

"Not the first time I've been called that," Hank said as Casey sighed and turned over. "Matt, what happened to you wasn't your fault, you know that."

"I'm not talking about this, Hank," Casey told him, "Not to you, not to those cops out there."

"They're just trying to help."

"I don't want their help."

"Casey, you could've died, _twice._ You're not stupid, Matt, I know you can appreciate what that means."

"What are you doing here, Voight?" Casey asked. He turned back to face the cop and asked him, "How did you even know where I was? Why'd you come to New York?"

"My people and I had to come out here last year to find Erin's brother, Teddy, who got caught in a child porn ring...then we had to come back a few months ago to help catch Gregory Yates, the guy who killed Nadia, you remember her. Both times we worked with those cops that you were playing dumb with earlier. They're good people, Matt, all they want to do is help."

"I don't want their help!" Casey snapped. "I don't need their help! And I don't need _your_ help either."

"Maybe not but right now I'm all you've got," Hank told him firmly.

"LEAVE-ME-ALONE!" Casey screamed at him.

Voight was unfazed by his outburst. "You saw the men that did this."

Casey shook his head.

"You said you didn't because you thought that way the questions would stop and the investigation would die out, it's not going to work that way, Casey," Voight was surprisingly calm as he spoke to the lieutenant. "Look, I know we got history together, and I know I'm the last person you want to see-"

"Oh you have no idea," Casey grumbled. He rolled on his side again to face away from the Intelligence sergeant and said half under his breath, "Some days I wish I _had_ killed you."

Hank didn't respond, and whatever he might've been thinking at that time, he kept to himself. He reached over and put his hand on Casey's shoulder and told him, "We're going to find the people that did this, Matt."

Casey shook his head in response.

"Matt, no matter _what_ you were doing out here, what happened wasn't your fault. Why didn't you tell anyone you were coming to Manhattan?"

"It's nobody's business," Casey weakly insisted. "It's none of _your_ business."

Voight was silent for a minute, he moved his hand onto Casey's back and rubbed it calmly, he heard as well as saw Casey recoil under the touch.

"When I got promoted to head the Intelligence unit, I made something very clear to all the detectives working under me. Tell _me_ the truth so I can lie for _you_. No matter how bad the truth is, I gotta know so I can help...it's the same thing here, Matt."

"I'm not talking about it," Casey repeated with his face half buried in the pillow. "Leave me alone."

Hank could see how hard this was for Casey to still come to terms with and he knew they wouldn't be getting anywhere anytime soon, he'd back off for now but he wasn't going to drop it.

"Those SVU detectives aren't the enemy here, Matt," he pointed out. "All they're trying to do is help you, and they will, if you'll let them."

"I don't want anybody's help," Casey said dejectedly. "I just want to go home to Chicago and forget everything that's gone on here."

Voight decided to leave Matt alone for the time being, as he headed towards the door he could just barely hear Casey say to himself, "I wish I never came here."

That got his attention and he looked back at the blonde man with his back to Hank. Whatever was going on, Voight wasn't going to drop it, and he knew Olivia Benson and her unit wouldn't either.


	6. Chapter 6

"Our murdered escort was _not_ attacked by the same people who raped Matt Casey," Olivia told the detectives in the squad room. "DNA came back, the killer is one James C. Racz, a repeat sex offender who has been in and out of Rikers for half a dozen charges in the last decade, he was last paroled 2 months ago."

"That wonderful rehabilitation we keep hearing so much about," Munch dryly commented.

"What about the DNA from Matt's case?" Voight asked.

"Not in the system, whoever these guys are, they've managed to not get caught before," Olivia said.

"So they're smart."

"Too smart, they knew to scout out a secluded area where not only were there no witnesses at the time of the attack but no surveillance cameras in that neighborhood and any that were weren't working," Elliot said.

"How's Matt holding up?" Olivia asked Hank.

"Kelly's staying at the hospital with him for the time being," Voight answered. "Apparently Casey's been having reactions to the antibiotics the docs gave him after the rape kit. Was there _any_ news on the DNA yet?"

"Only one, Matt's own DNA is excluded from the semen found at the scene," Olivia said.

"So we put him through hell for nothing," Elliot realized.

"He's an adult, he can deal with it," Voight said. He folded his arms against his chest and asked Olivia, "Are you sure there's no way to light a fire under the techs to dump Casey's phone records?"

She looked at him with a half amused smirk and replied, "Our city, our house, _our_ rules."

"Fair enough," he said.

"In the meantime we've been checking with Special Victims in the other 4 boroughs to see if they have any open rape cases that match ours," Elliot said. "There were only a few that they've been called to, and of them only a handful of the men were willing to say anything, the rest all deny anything happened and refuse to talk to investigators, so we really have no way of knowing if they're connected or not."

"And the ones that talked?" Voight asked.

"They all agree they didn't get a good look at their attackers, wouldn't be able to make any IDs," Olivia told him.

"Rape kits?"

"Most declined to have them done, others are stuck in a backlog of thousands of untested kits," she said.

"So what now?" Voight asked.

Cragen entered the squad room and answered, "We wait and see what develops in the morning, it's time for everyone to clock out."

"Are you heading back to the hospital, Hank?" Olivia asked as she sorted the paperwork at her desk to put away until tomorrow.

"I'll check on them later, yeah."

"Where're you staying in the meantime?" she asked.

"I'll get a hotel room," he answered.

"You mean you don't-" Olivia stopped, remembering that Voight had stayed at Casey's bedside all night while he was unconscious, "right..." she looked around and noticed the guys had already cleared out. She turned back to the Chicago cop and asked, "Would you mind walking me out?"

He smiled briefly and replied, "Nah, not at all."

* * *

"I feel bad we never get to meet under any better circumstances than these," Olivia said as they left the building.

"That's life, especially for cops," Voight replied.

"Still, it'd be nice if we could get together once _without_ it being because somebody was assaulted or kidnapped," she pointed out.

"True that."

"Uh..." she stopped by her car and said, "instead of getting a hotel room...after you finish at the hospital, why don't you come over to my apartment?"

Even in the dark she was able to make out the sly smirk on Voight's face. "Detective, is that an invitation?"

"Yeah," she answered smugly.

Her bluntness got a chuckle out of the Intelligence sergeant. He looked at her, and then nodded his head, "Okay, sure, it's a date."

She smiled at him. "I'll be waiting."

* * *

"Nice place you got here," Voight said as he looked around Olivia's apartment.

"Oh I'm sure it's not as nice as your place," she replied as they sat down on her couch with a couple drinks. "How're Matt and Kelly doing?"

"Casey's been sedated, Kelly's going to stay with him tonight, if there's any update he's going to call me," Hank answered.

"I wish we had more to go on, Hank," Olivia said.

"Still sure you can't light a fire under your tech crew?" Voight asked.

"You think Casey knows the men who did this?" she asked.

"Well he didn't just come out here for nothing, did he?"

"Any ideas?"

Voight shook his head. "I don't know much about Casey's private life, but I _know_ he's not gay. And I _don't_ know why he'd come out here."

"You seem very involved for somebody who tried to _kill_ him," she noted. In a more serious tone she added, "I can't believe you'd actually do that."

"Olivia, do you know me at all?" Voight replied.

"Hank-"

"Like I said, not something I'm proud of," he told her. "In hindsight I knew how big of a mess I made things...when I walked into that bar that night, I knew it didn't matter what I said, he wasn't going to accept my apology, but I figured it was a starting point. I'm just sorry that I wasn't able to fix things between us before Hallie got murdered."

Olivia looked at him and commented, "That really _was_ a turning point for you two, wasn't it?"

"Well...it made it so he could stand being in the same room as me," Hank answered, "I guess we inched along from there."

"So again, why are you so involved in his case?" she asked.

Voight looked at her through one eye, and turned his head and told her, "If you breathe a word of this to anybody, you'll be sorry."

"What?" Olivia asked, finding herself almost amused by his threats.

Hank looked at her and explained, "You think it wasn't hard to look at my kid and realize he didn't just screw up his own life but he completely ruined somebody else's _and_ the family's too? Then there's this firefighter...he's willing to do the right thing even if it means he gets killed...that's what I thought I raised my son to be like, I've spent a lot of years wondering where I went wrong, thinking I could fix it, fix _him_."

Olivia merely nodded, "I get that, I know the feeling."

"You know...Matt Casey is almost young enough he could be my kid," Hank told her.

Olivia blinked, "Okay, that's a little more than I needed to know," she let out a small laugh.

Voight intertwined his fingers together under his chin and stared straight ahead and told the SVU detective, "I think what I resented most of him back then is that he's what Justin _should_ have been like. I couldn't figure out where I'd failed him, and I took it out on Casey."

Olivia slowly nodded, "And you've been trying to make up for it ever since."

Hank shrugged, "He's a good guy, he didn't deserve what happened to him...and he doesn't deserve this."

Olivia rapped her knuckles against the arm of the couch, "Matt's not talking, the DNA doesn't match anybody in the database...and we can't get into his phone...I don't know what we're going to do."

Voight's eyes widened ever so slightly, looking every bit the part like a light bulb had just gone off over his head. He turned towards Olivia and told her, "I do."

"What?" she asked.

Instead of answering, Hank pulled out his phone and dialed a number. A few seconds later there was an answer.

"Antonio, it's me," he said. "Listen, break into Casey's apartment, get his laptop and get the tech guys started on it."

"Hank?" Olivia said.

Voight disconnected the call and told her, "Whatever we'll eventually find on his phone, my money says there's at least a trace of it on his home computer, one way or another we're going to get to the bottom of this."

"It's not legal," Olivia told him. "You just told a cop to break and enter and steal the victim's property. There is _no_ way this will hold up in court."

"That only matters if he was in direct contact with the guy who raped him," Voight replied. "We're going to operate on the assumption that it was just wrong place, wrong time and had nothing to do with why he came out here."

Olivia rolled her eyes and shook her head, but she had to admit he had a point. They had nothing to go on, and for whatever reason Matt Casey came out to New York, he wasn't acting like a victim, he clearly had something to hide, the question was what, and how did it connect to his attack, or _did_ it?

* * *

"Casey's being released from Mercy General, Severide's going to bring him down soon to sign for his personal effects," Voight told the SVU detectives the next morning.

"Well that's a good way to get him into an interview room," Munch commented, "the question is what'll make him talk?"

"I got an ace up my sleeve," Voight said. "I if I have to, I think I can break that ice."

"What's that?" Fin asked.

"I had my guys get Casey's computer at home and get the techs looking over it, if we can't get into his phone history, we should be able to find _something_ on his laptop," Voight told them, "and when he finds this out-"

"Heads are gonna roll," Munch commented. "The question is who's going to tell him?"

"I will," Hank answered.

"Oh good, I already had my back cracked once this month after apprehending a meth head," Munch said as he went over to his desk and sat down.

"We've tried running similar MOs of attacks on men who weren't locals, were here from out of state," Elliot explained, "even ran a cross-reference against any other vics with the same physical characteristics as Casey just incase our perp has a specific type, got nothing."

"Yeah well," Voight responded, "hopefully my guys will be able to come up with something soon."

"It would help if we had Severide in our corner to make sure Casey stays put and doesn't hop the next plane heading back to Chicago," Olivia said.

Voight nodded. "I'll handle Casey, you convince Severide it's in Matt's best interest to see this through."


	7. Chapter 7

"Casey's being released from Mercy General, Severide's going to bring him down soon to sign for his personal effects," Voight told the SVU detectives the next morning.

"Well that's a good way to get him into an interview room," Munch commented, "the question is what'll make him talk?"

"I got an ace up my sleeve," Voight said. "I if I have to, I think I can break that ice."

"What?" Fin asked.

"I had my guys get Casey's computer at home and get the techs looking over it, if we can't get into his phone history, we should be able to find _something_ on his laptop," Voight told them, "and when he finds this out-"

"Heads are gonna roll," Munch commented. "The question is who's going to tell him?"

"I will," Hank answered.

"Oh good, I already had my back cracked once this month after apprehending a meth head," Munch said as he went over to his desk and sat down.

"We've tried running similar MOs of attacks on men who weren't locals, were here from out of state," Elliot explained, "even ran a cross-reference against any other vics with the same physical characteristics as Casey just incase our perp has a specific type, got nothing."

"Yeah well," Voight responded, "hopefully my guys will be able to come up with something soon."

"It would help if we had Severide in our corner to make sure Casey stays put and doesn't hop the next plane heading back to Chicago," Olivia said.

Voight nodded. "I'll handle Casey, you convince Severide it's in Matt's best interest to see this through."

* * *

"I don't understand why I can't just sign at the front desk," Casey said as he and Severide walked through the squad room.

"Well things are pretty crazy right now and our boss wants to make sure nothing's misplaced, trust me, it'll be a lot easier to get this done in a nice quiet interview room instead of out front where any schizoid off his meds could come in and turn the place into a war zone," Munch explained as he showed the two firemen to an unoccupied room, "If you'll just go in there and have a seat, somebody will be with you shortly."

"You're not coming in?" Casey asked.

"Sorry, much as I would love to handle the more mundane aspects of this job, I'm actually on my way to question a homeless perp who's been screaming for the last 10 minutes that he can't find his head," Munch told them, "Mr. Severide, I'm going to have to ask you to stay out of the interview room-"

"Why?"

"It's all these pain in the ass bureaucratic regulations we're forced to put up with, I could go on about them all day-"

"And he will," Fin warned them as he passed by with a folder in his hand, "Trust me, it's better not to ask. Meanwhile, Kelly, I need to ask you some follow-up questions."

"Why? I don't know anything," Kelly said.

"More bureaucratic regulations," Munch told them, "don't you just love them?"

The two firefighters looked at each other, it was obvious neither of them wanted to be there any longer than they had to, finally Kelly spoke first, "I'll...be back soon, I hope."

"Mr. Casey, if you'll head on in, somebody will be in to help you momentarily," Munch said.

* * *

"I'm not talking to you," Casey told Elliot and Olivia as they entered the room.

"That's fine, we just need you to verify," Elliot held up a plastic bag containing a black leather wallet, "This is yours, right?"

"Yeah."

"Okay, we just need you to sign these forms for it," Olivia put some papers before him, "sign here, here, initial here."

Casey took the papers, glanced them over one by one and slowly signed them. Before the final signature, he asked them, "Is this it?"

"What do you mean?" Elliot asked.

"Is this all that was recovered?"

They looked at him, not giving anything away. Whatever was on his mind he seemed to shrug it off, "I don't suppose anybody found my phone."

"No, we found it with the wallet," Elliot answered.

Casey looked at them, "Then where is it?"

The door opened without a courtesy knock, Voight told the detectives, "Your captain wants to see you two."

Elliot and Olivia turned in their chairs and looked at the sergeant.

"We just got started," Olivia said.

"That might be, but," Voight nodded his head towards the door.

Benson and Stabler looked at each other and exchanged a mutual expression. The fact that Cragen would allow this kind of intrusion meant something was up. Reluctantly they decided to go along with it, and stood up from the table and left the room. As soon as Elliot was out the door, Voight shut it behind him and told Casey as he approached the table, "Now it's just you and me."

"What're you doing here?" Casey wanted to know.

"I'm assisting in this investigation," Hank answered.

"No, what're you doing _here_?" Casey asked.

Hank sat down in the chair across the table and told Matt, "Your phone has been confiscated as potential evidence, the crime techs are going over it right now."

Casey's eyes widened in realization. "What?"

"What choice did they have, Matt?" Hank asked softly, "Got a victim who's unconscious, no contact information, nobody to call, nobody who can explain what's going on, why you are even in this city, they needed answers and that was the only way to get it. Now we don't have the final report yet, but it's not going to be long."

Voight watched as Casey's entire expression slowly changed to a grimace of horror as he squeezed his eyes shut and groaned out a hardly audible, "Oh my God." He gritted his teeth together and choked out a mortified, "No!" He jumped up from the chair and demanded to know, "How could you do that?"

"Matt," Voight also got up and stepped around the table, "This is your last chance to tell me what we need to know before they get done going through everything. Whatever trouble you're in, now's the time to come clean."

Casey's eyes closed and he raked his hands over his face groaning, "No-no-no-no! This can't be happening!"

Voight grabbed him by the shoulders and told the lieutenant, "Matt, whatever it is, there's still time to fix this, but you've got to be honest with me."

It didn't even occur to Casey to struggle in the cop's hold, his chest was rising and dropping rapidly as his breathing became distressed, the only thing that came out of his mouth was a half coherent, "Everybody's gonna know, oh God..."

Casey wasn't hearing the words coming out of Voight's mouth, he started rambling denials and cries of despair that all reached a boiling point and he went rigid in the Intelligence cop's hold and screamed at the top of his lungs, shortly replaced as he slumped weightlessly against Voight's body and broke down crying. Voight put his arms around Casey and held the firefighter tight and tried to get him to calm down, even in his grip Casey sagged down towards the floor and rather than fight it, Voight steered into the skid and sank down on the floor with him, he held Casey in his arms and patiently waited as the blonde man sobbed hysterically, unable to form any words or even any coherent sounds.

Watching through the two-way mirror, Cragen, Olivia and Elliot stood at the wall and watched in confusion.

"So much for forcing Casey's hand," Elliot said, "this guy's a rock."

"He knows it's over, who's he still trying to protect?" Cragen wanted to know.

Olivia felt sick and reached over and cut the sound coming from the interview room. Not only did they not get any information out of Casey even with Voight's tactics, she felt they were intruding on a private moment and should leave the two men alone.

* * *

Kelly Severide, thankfully, hadn't been present for Casey's breakdown. Fin had been keeping him busy in a separate interview room where he couldn't hear what was going on.

"I don't know what I can tell you," he said as he leaned forward and rested his head on the table, feeling tired and lost and bordering on hopeless, "Casey never told me he was coming to New York, he didn't tell me anything."

"He have any enemies back home in Chicago?" Fin asked.

"Who doesn't?" Kelly replied as he sat back up. "Everybody at 51 does, people are always coming after us for some reason or other."

"Casey have a beef with anyone lately? Somebody that might've followed him out here?" Fin asked.

"Not that I can think of," Kelly shook his head, "nothing comes to mind."

"Would he tell you if he was in trouble?" Fin asked.

Kelly thought it over for a few seconds, "Not right away...not usually...but...if he was in over his head, he would've told me."

"Is there _anyone_ you can think of who might come after him like this?" Fin asked.

"Uh...no," Kelly answered, "I don't know what you know about Voight out there-"

"We have history."

"So do he and Casey," Kelly said, "he once hired these three goons to beat Casey up, but...even Voight, and he's the worst guy I know, or _was_ anyway...even he wouldn't do something like this."

"No kidding," Fin replied.

"Casey doesn't want the guy caught that did this," Kelly said, "he doesn't want to go to trial, he doesn't want everyone finding out what happened to him...is that really so horrible?"

"The problem is the guys that did this are gonna do it to someone else, and odds are already have, to several guys that we don't know about," Fin said, "It's more to prevent any future attacks on any other guys than solely for his benefit."

Kelly made a small sound in his throat as he took that in, "I didn't think about that."

"It sounds like a conflict of interest trying to get one victim to put themselves on the line to protect other victims from the same fate," Fin explained, "But we gotta look at the big picture, if we don't get these guys on one case, we'll be seeing more of them down the line, and cases like this where _nobody_ wants to go to court and have their private business exposed, it makes these guys invincible because they know with no complaining witness, the law can't touch them."

Kelly was silent for a few seconds before he looked at Fin and commented, "No wonder you guys are always getting burnt out. I'd rather run into a burning building than have to do this every day. But how long does Casey have to stay here? He just wants to go home."

"Understood, but we have to give this investigation everything we got and he can't really leave our jurisdiction until we make an arrest or we run out of leads," Fin told him.

Kelly groaned, "What do we do in the meantime?"

"Get a hotel room, we're not giving up yet," Fin said, "we're hoping TARU can find something on Casey's phone to explain what's going on, what he came out here for."

"Casey..._had_ a hotel room?" Kelly asked.

"Motel, real fleabag dump," Fin answered, "Whoever attacked him tossed his wallet with all his cash and credit cards still in it. Clearly he could've afforded a better place to stay, we couldn't figure out why he was staying there."

"Neither can I," Kelly said, as he shifted in his chair, "I'll find a place for us to stay. Um...you've been doing this a long time?"

"More than 10 years now," Fin said.

"So...any advice?" Kelly asked. "I mean how does this work? What do I say to him?"

"What have you said to him?"

Kelly shook his head, "Not much, I don't know what to tell him. I...I don't really have any experience with this...my...I have a sister, a half sister, my dad...I didn't meet her until she was already grown up...somebody kidnapped her, and did to her...what they did to Casey...she left town and I didn't get much chance to talk to her...I had no idea what to say then either."

Fin watched the Squad lieutenant intently as this revelation came out, and after a pause he told Severide, "Most of us have personal motives why we choose this line of work, it never gets easier talking to the victims. In my opinion it doesn't matter much what you say, just as long as he knows you got his back, that's the important thing."

Kelly glumly nodded in response. Then he asked the SVU detective, "Can I see Casey now?"


	8. Chapter 8

Olivia stood at the mirror with her arms crossed and watched Voight and Casey. The two men had been on the floor for almost 20 minutes, she couldn't hear what was going on but she'd had enough experience with victims that watching Voight as he held the fireman in his arms and spoke gently to him, she could guess how it was going. Finally Casey seemed to calm down and he pulled away from Hank and the two stood up, the fireman's face was streaked red with tears and his eyes were puffy, Hank placed a hand on Matt's shoulder and said something to him, Casey weakly nodded but didn't say anything as he used the back of his hand to brush away the tears that traveled halfway down his face.

"This is weird," Elliot commented as he stepped beside Olivia, "This doesn't look like two guys that tried to kill each other."

"Hank's trying to make amends for what happened back then," Olivia said, realizing she knew more about the situation than Elliot did, knowing he wasn't likely to get it, and knowing he likely wouldn't understand it even if she explained it.

"An-n-n-d, it still doesn't look like he gave it up," Elliot said. "Casey knows we're going to find out whatever he's got on his phone, why doesn't he just confess?"

"Well, above all else he hasn't asked for a lawyer, so whatever it is, it's probably not anything illegal," Olivia noted.

"And we're _sure_ the gay angle's out?" Elliot asked.

"_You_ want to ask him?" Olivia replied.

"Hey," Fin said as he came up to them.

They turned around and Elliot inquired, "Get anything out of Kelly?"

"Maybe," Fin answered, "Turns out his sister was raped a year ago, they never found the guy responsible, there was a prime suspect, a Vince Keeler, local gang member who hasn't been seen since."

Liv and Elliot turned and looked at each other as they considered this.

"Voight should know something about that," Elliot said.

The door opened and they saw Voight and Casey leave the room and saw Voight escort Casey to the men's room. Elliot followed them down the corridor, a few seconds after they went in, he pushed the door and entered behind them. He saw Voight standing adjacent to the sink that Casey was bent over as he cupped his hands under the cold water and splashed it on his face.

"Detective," Voight said curtly, which drew Casey's attention and the blonde man shut off the water and turned around to see what was going on.

"Our captain would like to speak to you," Elliot said with a stone face but a knowing look in his eyes.

* * *

"How come you didn't tell us about Severide's sister being raped?" Elliot asked when they got Voight back to the squad room.

"Our focus is on Matt Casey, not Severide's family," Voight answered, "Or am I missing something?"

"You worked that case?" Olivia asked.

"Yeah, while she was missing, then we looked for Vince Keeler...he never turned up, it was always assumed he left town."

"And nobody's seen him since?" Elliot asked.

"Not that we know of, what's that got to do with this?" Hank wanted to know.

"Why was Katie Severide targeted?" Olivia asked.

Voight looked like a light bulb went off, "Retaliation against Kelly, he and Keeler got into it, he tried to bash Kelly's head in during a blackout, it didn't work, so he kidnapped Katie and raped her."

"And now Kelly's best friend has also been raped," Olivia said. "That's a big coincidence."

Hank looked around at the detectives skeptically, "You think this is a vendetta against Severide?"

"Believe me it wouldn't be the strangest theory," Munch told the Chicago cop, "After 12 years in sex crimes, we've seen them all, and a lot of them more than once."

"Except a vic who's so dead set against saying _anything_ about their attack even when they know whatever secret they're holding onto is about to come out in the open," Olivia added. "There has to be a reason Casey won't talk."

Voight grunted, "So you're thinking he was threatened?"

"Either him, or maybe he was threatened with Severide's life if he talked," Elliot said. "Casey seems pretty self-sacrificial, but he wouldn't endanger somebody else's life, would he?"

Voight shook his head. "This is a stretch though. Vince Keeler wouldn't have the brains to orchestrate something like this, and he wouldn't be able to lure Casey 1,000 miles from home to do it. The best bet is that he's dead by now, just another forgotten gang banger that nobody even misses."

"Well we got nothing else to go on right now," Olivia said, "have you heard from your guys about Casey's computer?"

"They're still looking," Voight answered.

"So, we have nothing to go on right now," Elliot said.

"Did Casey say _anything_ to you in there?" Olivia asked.

"Nah," Voight shook his head.

Olivia threw her hands up, "What are we missing here? What is Casey still trying to hide?"

"You know," Munch addressed Voight, "We get a lot of people who don't mind telling _us_ what's going on just to clear the air, but beg us not to tell their spouses, their families, this guy doesn't want _anybody_ to know what's going on. If he can't even disclose anything to us, what's he going to tell everybody he works with back in Chicago when they want to know why he up and disappeared?"

"Good question," Voight answered.

"How has Severide put up with Casey giving him the cold shoulder on this so far?" Elliot asked.

"He hasn't asked any questions, that's how."

"Why would he do that?" Elliot asked. "My best friend winds up in the hospital, I want to know what happened."

"But you'd also know not to press him for details," Voight pointed out, "especially if he didn't want to get into it."

"But that only carries so much weight, they know eventually I'm gonna be asking," Elliot replied.

"Matt's hoping to bury this thing as soon as he gets back to Illinois," Olivia said. "He's hoping by giving us the runaround that we won't catch the perp and the case dies."

"If things keep on like this, that could actually happen," Elliot commented.

* * *

A small sound caught in Olivia's throat and she pushed against Hank as she pulled back from the kiss and scooted back on the cushion on her side of the couch.

"What's wrong?" he asked.

"Sorry," she said.

It was the first time since they'd met that they'd made any actual attempt at an intimate relationship, after the first time they'd had to join forces it had been apparent to both that there was _something_ between them but they'd never gotten a chance to find out what it was. Life and the job always interrupted. When they returned to Olivia's apartment they had dinner, and a couple of drinks, and decided to see where it went. But Olivia had quickly realized where it was going was towards a roaring stop, not an unusual experience for her. Still she felt the need to explain, "It's...never easy trying to be with someone with this job. Either the gory details put them off, or they get too interested..."

"And then there's cops," Voight replied.

"The _only_ people who can possibly understand it...and often the _worst_ people to get involved with."

"Hey."

"Present company excluded," she offered a small smile, but it quickly gave way to a sigh as she told Hank, "I just can't stop thinking about what happened to Matt...I can't believe he'd be willing to go to such lengths to avoid explaining any part of it...if he's not involved in anything illegal and this _wasn't_ a gay hookup gone wrong he doesn't want the people at Firehouse 51 to find out about...why won't he tell us anything?"

"That's the million dollar question," Voight told her. "I'm hoping by tomorrow my guys got some answers."

Olivia leaned back against the couch and looked towards the ceiling as she said, "The thing I hate is when this investigation is over, you'll be going back to Chicago and then I won't get to see you again until...the next time we have to work together."

"Gives working relationships a whole new meaning," Voight commented.

"Yeah, the problem is we never get a chance to enjoy it," she replied.

Hank looked at her mischievously through the corner of one eye, "Oh we can enjoy it." He reached an arm around Olivia's shoulders and pulled her against him.

Olivia giggled, "This is nice," and leaned her head against his shoulder.

Voight looked at her, she appeared to be lost in thought, and he asked, "What're you thinking, Olivia?"

She stared blankly towards the wall and answered, "Wondering what's going through Matt Casey's mind right now."

* * *

The screaming woke Kelly up. His eyes flew open and he shot up in the bed trying to figure out what was going on and trying to find the light. He hopped out of bed and ran into the wall feeling for the switch, he finally found it and as the hotel room lit up he saw Casey sitting up in the other bed, eyes wide open but he was still screaming. Kelly went over towards him but was careful not to get in Casey's reach, "Casey, CASEY!"

Matt blinked and his yells of terror carried on a couple more seconds before stopping entirely, he looked around the room and blinked again. "Kelly?"

"It's alright, buddy, it's just me," Kelly spoke softly and slowly, "You're safe."

Casey looked around the room as he breathed heavily.

"It was just a nightmare," Severide tried to assure him, "You're alright."

Casey shakily got to his feet and told him, "Kelly, let's just get out of here and go back home."

"Casey, we are _not_ going to the airport at 1 o' clock in the morning," Kelly said.

"Not the airport, I don't ever want to get on a plane again," Casey shook his head.

Before he could say anything else, Kelly asked him, "What happened?"

"I've never been on a plane before in my life, my first time on one and the whole way here I thought I was going to throw up, I couldn't _wait_ for it to land and get off," Casey said. "We can find a bus heading to Illinois and leave tonight...please, Kelly, I don't want to stay here."

Kelly forced himself to stay calm so he could hopefully keep Casey calm, "I know you don't, and I'm sorry, but we can't do that."

"We have to!" Casey responded in despair, "If we stay here, they're gonna...they're gonna..."

Even now Kelly could see Matt couldn't bring himself to explain what had happened, not to him, and not why he came to New York in the first place. It was killing Severide not to know what was going on, but he knew he couldn't push Casey on it.

Instead he tried to be reassuring for his friend's sake, "Casey, it's going to be alright," he saw Matt shaking his head and open his mouth to argue but he cut him off, "I'm going to stay with you the whole way on this until we _can_ go back home."

"I don't want you to," Casey said weakly. "I don't want you to know what happened."

"Casey it doesn't matter," Kelly told him.

Casey grimaced as he inhaled as if breathing was suddenly too painful for him, "It matters to _me_. Please, let's just get out now before they find out anything, I want to put all this behind me."

"How?" Kelly knew he was on dangerous ground now, but he thought he was entitled to some explanation, "How can you put it behind you? Even when we get back to Chicago, you're still going to remember."

"That's not what worries me," Casey told him. "If they make an arrest...if it goes to trial...I have to put in a furlough to come out here to testify and then _everybody_ hears what happened to me, it becomes a matter of public record, and when everybody back home finds out, _nobody_ is going to look me in the eye again, they would all be too disgusted by me, _of_ me."

Nothing he was saying made any sense to Kelly, he couldn't imagine anything so horrible that Casey's words could actually hold water. Everybody at 51 knew what an upstanding guy he was, nobody could possibly look at him and think any of this was his fault.

Kelly shook his head helplessly, "Matt, that is _not_ going to happen."

"Yes it will if anybody finds out..."

"Matt," Kelly tried to think, "If they _do_ find the bastard that did this...they can't arrest him if you don't press charges...I know this is hard but I think you just need to let them do their job. Think of it this way," he cut Casey off when the blonde man opened his mouth to protest, "They know what they're doing, they know whoever it is, isn't going to stop, they'll do it again to someone else. Okay so let them identify the guy, and then when we're gone, they can keep eyes on him and stop him from doing it to someone else. That way, he gets caught, he goes to jail, you don't have to do anything."

"But they'll _know_, Kelly," Casey moaned.

"And they can't say anything to anybody back home about it," Kelly said, "nobody will find out."

"You'll know," Casey moaned as he squeezed his eyes shut, "You'll know, Voight will know."

"Voight's not going to tell anybody either, you know that, he wouldn't do that," Kelly told him.

Casey inhaled uneasily and fell back against the edge of the mattress and collapsed on the bed crying. Kelly could just imagine everything weighing on him: the fear, the shame, the guilt, the frustration, the exhaustion.

Kelly felt like a rock was lodged in his throat, he wasn't sure what to do or what might make things worse.

"Matt," he stood over Casey, who had his back to him, "Matt...can I touch you? I mean," he scrambled to amend his poor choice of words, "Can I hug you? Is that okay?"

Casey rolled over and looked at him curiously, a choked sob caught in his throat as he conceded and held his arms out, Kelly bent down and pulled Casey into a loose embrace.

"It's going to be okay," he told his best friend, "Everything's going to be alright, you're gonna get through this."

* * *

The screams woke him up again.

Kelly shot up in bed in the dark and tried to remember what was going on, but before he could reach for the light the screams abruptly stopped. There was silence in the room except for the creak of the bed springs as Casey sat up in his bed.

"Case?"

The Truck lieutenant's voice was small in the dark as he quietly responded, "Sorry..."

"It happened again?" Kelly asked.

There was no answer, but he could tell.

"You want me to turn on the light?"

"No," the voice answering him was even smaller now.

Kelly's eyes adjusted to the darkness, the only light in the room was the red digits on the clock, 2:24 A.M. By now he could make out the shape of Casey sitting up in his bed. He could hear Matt's strangled breathing as he tried to calm himself down without being heard.

"You want," Kelly spoke slowly, testing the waters, "me to come over there?"

There was silence. He watched the outline of Casey in the dark, he turned his head and looked over at Severide, then turned his head back, then slowly moved over to the other side of the bed and pulled the covers back.

Kelly got up and went across to the other bed, sat on the edge and pulled his feet up and laid out beside Matt.

"You okay?" Kelly asked as he pulled the covers up.

"...No..."

Kelly merely nodded though he wasn't sure if Matt could see him. He bent his knees and half sat up and reached over and pulled Casey against him and held him in his arms. Casey didn't fight him, if anything Kelly would swear he could feel Casey holding his breath. After a few seconds his body relaxed as he softly broke down sobbing. Kelly pressed the side of his face against Casey's temple and said nothing as he held his best friend and waited for him to cry himself to sleep.

* * *

Olivia heard a phone buzzing and she slowly opened her eyes. She and Voight had fallen asleep sitting up on the couch and the lights were still on, though they'd been dimmed earlier in the night.

"Is that mine or yours?" she asked as she stretched to get the circulation going back in her arms.

"Mine," Hank answered as he pulled his phone out and answered, "Yeah? ...What? Alright, I'll be right there."

"What is it?" Olivia asked.

"911 was dispatched to the hotel Casey and Severide are staying at," Hank told her as he got up.


	9. Chapter 9

"Oh my God," Olivia said when they walked up on the scene of police cars and an ambulance all with their lights flashing and saw Kelly standing at the curb with a fist sized bruise covering one side of his face.

"Casey did that to you?" Hank asked.

"It was an accident, he didn't mean it," Kelly insisted.

"What happened?" Olivia asked.

"He woke up screaming, I tried to get him to calm down and he just started swinging at me, he flashed back," Kelly said, "somebody called the cops, this wasn't his fault, Voight."

"Alright, I'll get it taken care of," Voight said assuredly and determinedly, "Where is he?"

"In the ambo, they pumped him full of Haldol because he wouldn't calm down," Severide's voice was shaking as he spoke, and the rest of him wasn't far behind. "They-they said they're taking him to Bellevue...that's the...mental hospital?"

"Okay, Kelly," Olivia spoke in her seasoned voice of experience as an SUV detective dealing with frazzled victims and frantic witnesses and suspects, "We are going to get this figured out, right now I need you to calm down. You need to let the medics take a look at you."

"No, I'm fine," he insisted, "but what about Casey? They're getting ready to take him."

"Okay, we're going to find out what's going on, just stay here," Olivia told him. She and Voight headed over to the ambulance and flashed their badges to the paramedics.

"What happened?" Olivia asked.

"Guy went crazy and started beating on his roommate, we had to sedate him before we could even pull him off the other guy," the paramedic answered.

"Okay, he's a victim in an open rape investigation," Olivia told them, "Something triggered a flashback, he's not psychotic."

"That might be but he _is_ dangerous right now without the drugs to keep him calm."

"Where are you taking him?"

"Bellevue, docs will probably admit him to the psyche ward for a temporary hold."

"Okay, we'll follow," Olivia said.

"Severide, you ride with us," Voight called out as he waved Kelly over.

* * *

Casey _wasn't_ admitted to the psyche ward, yet, he was kept in a temporary room while the doctors waited for him to wake up from the Haldol, Kelly and the cops stood around the rest of the night and into the early morning waiting for that to happen.

"So what happened?" Voight asked Severide. "Really?"

"It's embarrassing," Kelly said as he shifted in the chair by Casey's hospital bed.

"What?" Olivia asked.

Kelly reluctantly looked at them and answered, "He'd been having nightmares off and on all night, every time he woke up screaming...I thought...I sat up with him in his bed when he came down off the last one...we fell asleep like that, and I..." he pursed his lips together for a second before confessing, "I rolled over on him, and I didn't know it until he was screaming. I tried to get off of him but he turned over and started hitting me because I didn't move away fast enough."

"Kelly, that wasn't your fault," Olivia told him, "Casey needs to get psychiatric help to cope with his attack."

"He's not going to do that," Kelly responded.

Voight opened his mouth but before anything came out, Olivia raised her hand to get his attention and took the lead, "We have a doctor on our staff who can come in and speak with him, Dr. George Huang, he's with the FBI and he might be able to help us out."

"How?" Kelly asked.

"He might be able to get Casey to talk, we might be able to find out who did this to him."

Kelly shook his head, "No offense, if he won't even tell me, he's _not_ going to tell a shrink."

"He still hasn't told you anything?" Voight asked.

"No...and it's driving me nuts, but I know I can't push him," Kelly said.

Voight looked at the Squad lieutenant and told him, "Kelly, if you knew who did this you'd probably get yourself killed trying to track them down and kill them, it's no wonder he won't tell you, he knows how you'd react."

Severide looked at the Intelligence sergeant and said quietly, "I never thought about that."

Olivia had to admit Voight's argument against Vince Keeler being responsible sounded credible, still she felt a need to interject into the conversation, "Kelly, it's possible that part of Matt's reluctance to talk to anybody has been an attempt to protect _you_."

He looked at her and blinked. "Me?"

"You two are friends, he doesn't want you going to jail for killing the bastards that did this to him," Voight pointed out.

Casey softly groaned and everybody looked at him. He slowly opened his eyes and it was obvious he was still loopy from the drugs he was on since he couldn't open his eyes all the way.

"Casey? You alright, buddy?" Kelly asked as he leaned over him.

Casey slowly grimaced when he saw the bruise on Kelly's face, "I hit you..."

Kelly almost laughed, "It's alright."

"I'm sorry."

"It's okay, Matt."

"I'm sorry," the Truck lieutenant tiredly repeated, it seemed to be about all he was capable of saying at the moment.

"Casey, hey, hey, look at me," Kelly tried to get his attention, "You don't need to worry about it, all you need to do is rest, just close your eyes and go back to sleep, I'll be right here, okay?"

Casey's eyes were already about fully closed but he seemed to be hanging on Severide's every word, he slowly nodded his head in agreement.

"Okay? Okay," Kelly told him as he pulled the blanket up, "Everything's okay, just take it easy, I'm right here and I'm not leaving you."

"We'll check in later to see how he's doing," Olivia told Severide. "Let us know if there's an update."

Kelly simply nodded in response.

The two cops left the hospital room and headed for the exit.

"This is getting complicated," Voight noted simply.

"Nothing I haven't seen before," Olivia said, "Victims clam up, recant, they suffer from PTSD, the littlest thing can set them off, but Hank, are you _sure_-"

"Olivia, you got a dirty mind," Hank told her with a hint of a smirk on his face, "Why are you so hot on these two being gay?"

"This is new territory," Olivia explained, "We've seen just about everything imaginable in this line of work, every kind of victim possible, every kind of victim's family possible, and the ones I have almost _never_ seen are times when a man is raped and the person standing by him the whole way isn't his girlfriend or his wife, but is a man, who's not his boyfriend or his husband, but his best friend. We've almost never seen that, Hank, once a while there'll be a brother, a dad, but nothing like this. It's hard to get any victims to come forward but honestly we've had worse luck convincing straight men to press charges than gay men, they may have issues of not coming out to their families, but on top of everything else they have to endure at trial, straight men don't want the jury and the public and their own families to think they're gay. And the ones that do decide to go forward, almost never have the public support of their friends. It's sad."

"I agree," Voight remarked.

Olivia heard a phone ping, before she could ask Voight answered, "It's mine," and he took it out and checked the message that just came through.

"What is it?" she asked.

"We gotta get to your squad room," Hank told her, "It's Antonio, he and Mouse got done pouring over Casey's computer and they want to Skype the results they found."


	10. Chapter 10

Voight and everybody at SVU were gathered around the computer and watched as Mouse and Antonio Dawson came on the screen from the bullpen at the 21st District.

"Okay, for the record," Mouse told Voight, "I haven't slept in like 3 days, there was a lot of stuff to look through."

"What'd you find?" Elliot asked.

"First," Mouse held up an index finger to get their attention, "I went all the way back to when Matt Casey got his email account just to make sure what was recent contact with somebody new and who the regulars are. He's had this account for 11 years, and the first few years there was regular contact with a few people, the most common contacts were Kelly Severide, Hallie Thomas, and Andy Darden."

"Darden was a fireman on Casey's company, he died in a house fire a couple years back," Voight explained to the SVU detectives, "Go on."

"Most contact dropped after the first few years, the only regular contact after that was Kelly Severide, the two exchanged emails almost daily, up until 2007."

"That's about the time when text messaging first started to really pick up speed," Elliot commented.

"Right, and since it's quick and easy, it replaced emails by and large for daily communication," Mouse said. "After that, contact with anybody in general has been bare minimum, most emails are work related or for online shopping accounts, a few from members of his family, his sister Christie, his niece Violet, a few from his mom, Nancy."

"She just got out of prison not too long ago, it was probably a new experience for her," Olivia noted.

"We also had him go over Casey's entire internet search history just to see if he'd gotten into anything unethical," Antonio broke in.

"And?" Voight asked.

"No dark web activity, no questionable searches, a few softcore porn pictures, but all from legal, adult age websites."

"Sounds like a whole lot of nothing," Munch noted, "but I'm guessing you didn't want to video chat if that's all it was."

Mouse explained, "Casey's email activity hit a spike about 3 months back, there were messages exchanged every two days when he would've been off-shift, the grand total was about 600 emails back and forth."

"With who?" Voight wanted to know.

"A woman." On the screen they saw Mouse turning another computer around, he hit some keys and a picture came up of a beautiful dark haired woman in her late 20s or early 30s posing in a thin white T-shirt and blue capris. "According to her profile, her name is Dahlia Meehan, 31 years old, lives in Manhattan."

"Casey's dirty secret is a woman?" Elliot asked. "That doesn't make sense."

"She doesn't look like an escort," Olivia noted, and asked Mouse, "What was it, one of those sugar baby websites?"

"No, actually we poured over Casey's finances," Antonio answered, "There has been no withdrawal of cash from his bank account in the last 3 months, and no major hits on his credit card until he bought his plane ticket."

"So why's he hiding this?" Elliot asked, "There has to be a catch somewhere."

"That's what we thought too, we went over everything," Antonio told them.

"They've exchanged a few pictures but nothing X rated," Mouse explained, "in fact...this is about the raunchiest thing we found." He hit some other keys and another picture came up of the same woman in yoga pants and a hot pink workout bra with her hair tied back in a braid. "We spent one whole day just going over everything Casey ever deleted off his computer, a lot of junk emails, still nothing suspicious."

"So what's the catch?" Munch wanted to know.

"That's the thing," Mouse said, "As far as I can tell, there is no catch. It's all legitimate, Casey met this woman on a dating site."

Voight's eyebrows raised, "That's it?"

"The site's legitimate, we checked it out too," Antonio told them, "it's been in service for 5 years, to date they've had no legal troubles."

"Something's missing here," Fin said, "if that's all it is, Casey should've offered that up no problem."

"Unless there's something he's embarrassed about," Olivia said, and asked Mouse, "Did she ever ask him for money, gifts, anything? Anything that suggests she was using him for something?"

"No," he shook his head, "That's the thing, we've gone over every email, he's offered nothing, she's asked for nothing, it all reads like a legitimate online hookup and they decided to meet in real life."

"And that's why Casey came to New York," Elliot said, feeling like a major piece of the puzzle was still missing.

"So where _is_ this woman?" Olivia asked. "Casey didn't bring anybody back to his motel room, and none of the restaurants in the vicinity ever saw him, so they _had_ to have made contact."

"He went home with her...still doesn't sound like something worth going to this much trouble to hide," Elliot noted.

"We got the ISP for her email address," Mouse told the cops, "And I'm sending you her contact information."

"We're also going to be sending the emails on over to you guys so you can see if there's anything we missed," Antonio added. "I gotta tell you, we went over everything twice, and if there's anything here that can explain everything, we ain't seeing it."

"I hope our printer's got a new ink cartridge," Munch commented.

"Alright, thanks," Voight told them.

* * *

"I gotta tell you," Elliot said as he looked up from the pile of papers he was reading through, "If Kathy left me and I decided to try internet dating, I'd be embarrassed to admit this stuff too."

Olivia shook her head, "I don't get it, I'm not seeing anything here that would warrant Casey's reluctance to talk to us. This looks like a straight forward online relationship."

"Far be it for me to interject my own personal knowledge on the subject," Munch said as he walked by with a new cup of coffee.

Elliot did a double take, "What do you know about online dating, Munch?"

"Hey, a guy's gotta do something with his free nights, right?" John asked. "We pulled up Dahlia Meehan's dating profile from the site, there are a lot of telltale red flags that are worth the online equivalent of running for the hills, which is to ignore those people completely...old photos, particularly alluring photos that are way too confident for just trying to find someone, photos at, on or around expensive or flashy backgrounds with nobody else in them, who list more details of what they're _not_ looking for than _are_, who can't stop talking about themselves, and _none_ of that pops up on her page. Hell if I was 10 years younger _I'd_ probably initiate contact with her."

"Munch, you wouldn't have any luck if you were 20 years younger," Elliot replied.

"Ha ha ha," John dryly responded.

"Another red flag is they generally want to meet as quickly as possible," Olivia said, and when she caught the look Elliot shot towards her she told him, "Shut up." Staring back down at the printed out emails, she pointed out, "Casey talks to this woman every day for 3 months and they just _now_ decide to meet? If he was sending her money or gifts or something like that and she was milking him for all he was worth, it would make sense, but she was getting nothing out of this, that sounds like it was legit."

Something occurred to Olivia and she flipped through the pages she'd read and she called over to the next desk, "Elliot, can I see your papers for a minute?"

"Yeah, why? You find something?" he asked as he swapped with her.

"No, I'm not," Olivia answered aloofly, "And that's what's so strange." She skimmed through his sheets and didn't find what she was looking for either. She hopped up from her chair and asked the others, "Has anybody seen a single mention of Casey being a firefighter in the emails they're reading?"

Fin and Munch went back over theirs briefly and both shook their heads. Voight came up and offered the ones he'd been looking over to Olivia and asked her, "What's your point?"

"I don't know, but it's odd he wouldn't mention that," she answered as she flipped through his and threw them down in frustration, "These two talked about _everything_ in three months, likes, dislikes, movies, restaurants, where they grew up, their families, where they went to school, and Casey doesn't tell her what he does for a living?"

"That's virtually unheard of on a dating site," Munch commented. "People lie about their jobs all the time, but flat out omit it? No way."

"Something else that might be worth noting," Elliot said, "The picture on Casey's dating profile...what would be easier than him to upload a pic in his uniform for it? But there is nothing in the picture that indicates he's a fireman."

Olivia looked at the screenshot and realized, "We've seen this picture before, it was the one on his phone when we found it."

"The one of him and Kelly Severide," Elliot caught on, "He cuts Kelly out of the picture and boom, instant profile pic."

"Sounds like he went to a lot of trouble to keep his work out of the conversation," Fin thought. "But why?"

"Okay, everybody take back your own sections and look over them again," Olivia said, "we must be missing something. Hank, will you make sure we've got all the copies?"

"Sure," Voight answered.

* * *

"I found something!" Olivia told the others as she earmarked a page.

"What is it?" Fin asked as he went over to her desk.

Olivia read the email transcripts, "Dahlia: I work part time at a hair salon and also teach yoga classes at the gym, what about you?" Casey: "I am self employed with a small construction company." That's all he says," Olivia looked up, "Why wouldn't he say he was a firefighter?"

"Yeah, that's usually a good line to draw the women in," Fin said, "Those calendars usually go like hotcakes and a lot of women expect reality to live up to the fantasy on those pages."

"It's also a lot of work related details that could scare off a good thing," Elliot commented, "Same reason my marriage has been about to fall off a cliff 10 times in as many years."

"That's because you _don't_ tell Kathy what goes on on the job," Olivia pointed out.

"_That's_ because I really don't think she could handle hearing about what we see the scum of the earth doing to innocent victims every single day," Elliot remarked.

"And who wants to hear about burnt bodies and dead kids when you're trying to spark a romance with somebody and they ask you about your day?" Munch added, "I can see why he'd leave it out, it keeps that whole can of worms closed. He was probably waiting to see if this actually went anywhere in person before dropping that bombshell on her."

"Speaking of, where's Dahlia's address?" Olivia asked as she looked through the papers.

"I got it," Voight answered, "I also got your guys going over all _her_ information, see if she's got a record, what _her_ finances look like, anything that'll give us something to work with."

"How'd you do that?" Olivia asked.

"I lit a fire under them," he answered with a small defiant smirk. "Let's go."

"Hold it," Cragen came into the room, "You're not going anywhere."

"Excuse me?" Voight asked.

"No offense, Sergeant Voight, but if somebody _did_ lure Casey out here for some reason, it's possible they'd recognize you. Benson and Stabler will go check it out, you stay put until we get some more answers."

Voight looked at the captain, and everybody else looked at him, after a brief pause Hank responded, "Okay, captain."

* * *

Elliot rapped on the door for the second time, but neither he nor Liv were expecting an answer now anymore than the first time when nobody opened the door.

"No car in the driveway," Olivia noted.

Elliot leaned over and looked in the big front window, "I don't see anyone in there, don't hear anything either."

Olivia turned and saw the woman next door out on her porch getting the mail, "El."

They cut across the front yard and flashed their badges.

"Excuse me, Miss," Olivia said, "do you know the woman who lives next door?"

"Well I've seen her, I don't really know her," she answered.

"When was the last time you saw her?" Elliot asked.

"A few nights ago when she cleared out, her and those two men," the woman said.

"Two men?" Olivia asked.

Elliot pulled up the picture of Casey on his phone and asked, "Is this one of the men?"

"I'm not sure, it was late and I didn't get a good look," the woman said, "I just heard the voices when they left...I couldn't really make out anything they said."

"Do the men come here often?" Elliot asked.

"I don't know, I've seen the cars a few times but, I try to mind my own business," the woman answered. "What's this about?"

"Miss Meehan might've been the witness to an accident a couple nights ago, we need to ask her some questions," Elliot said. "Thank you, have a nice day."

"Come on, let's get back," Olivia said as they walked down the sidewalk, "I've got an idea."

"What's that?" Elliot asked.

"I'm going to put my time in computer crimes to good use," Olivia told him.


	11. Chapter 11

"This is so sad," Olivia said as she showed Elliot the last sheet of paper in the stack she'd been reading, "Casey's last email on his computer dated the night before his flight to New York, 'I have a ticket for tomorrow, I'll be at JFK by 6 P.M., I can't wait to get there and meet you in person, I've never been to New York and don't know what to expect, but I know I'll have a great time when we can finally be together'."

"Guy really fell head over heels for this woman," Elliot noted, "it definitely does _not_ sound like an invite to a three-way."

"Assuming Casey was one of the two men at the house that night," Olivia replied.

"Did you find anything off Dahlia's email address?" Elliot asked.

"Yeah," she answered, "Mouse said Casey had minimal contact with two other women on the site before he started talking to Dahlia...but I've been going over her own history on the site, she has made contact with 20 different guys and had extended contact with seven of them, all of them planning to meet at different times and dates."

"She hit any of them up for cash?" Fin asked.

"No, same thing, no mention of money, no gifts, no sexts between them, it's not even part of the conversation," Olivia said.

"Well she's sure going through a lot of guys for a whole lot of _nothing_," Munch commented. "Why? What's her angle?"

"We've got people looking through Dahlia's finances, no major deposits or withdrawals, and as far as the IRS is concerned she's living well within her means, all her bills are paid off, there's no suspicious banking activity."

"So what the hell is going on?" Voight asked.

"I don't know, but look at this," Olivia said, "she changed her profile pic every few months."

A slideshow ran through on the computer screen of Dahlia Meehan taken at different times of the year with a different look each time. Different clothes, different hairstyle, different hair color, different scenery behind her every time, but clearly the same woman.

"What I believe Huang would call suggestive, but not explicit," Munch said as he pointed to the pictures of the same woman smiling flirtatiously and posing ever so slightly in each picture to accentuate one feature or another. In some photos she wore thin shirts that were practically see-through, in another she wore a skirt with a high slit on the thigh, others she wore a low cut blouse or a halter top and was just slightly bent over.

"That's going to get the attention of _any_ guy with a pulse," Elliot said.

"But it's subtle enough that a lot of guys probably wouldn't take the bait," Olivia responded, "there's nothing here that doesn't suggest she's Little Miss Hometown America, the girl next door, not exactly the go-to for a quick and cheap hookup."

"Which our friend Matt Casey clearly wasn't in the market for, hence why he hit it off with her," Munch noted.

"Yeah, but her appearance isn't all she changed," Olivia said, "every time she changed her picture, she changed her profile. Different job, different city, different likes and dislikes."

"Now that's what I call playing the field," Munch said, "like she was looking for something specific."

"Or hoping something specific would find her," Olivia replied. "I found the profiles of the seven men she agreed to meet with."

The pictures came on the screen, all good looking men in their 30s, all of them white, of various builds, from various states, with various listed interests.

"Oh my God," Elliot said as his eyes doubled in size.

"What?" Olivia asked.

"What is it, detective?" Voight wanted to know.

Elliot pointed to the 2nd and 5th men on the screen, their listed names were Randall Mixon and Terry Daheim, "I know these guys."

"Where?" Voight asked.

"When we were checking with the other four boroughs for any cases matching Casey's attack..." he pointed to them one by one, "Bronx SVU, he was taken to the hospital and they got pictures, but he denied anything happened and he left before a full exam could be done...Brooklyn SVU, he had to get stitches, he agreed to the rape kit just to get the antibiotics but he wouldn't talk to the cops and he never filed a report."

The air in the squadroom became thick and heavy, even though there were the usual noises in the background of phones ringing and people talking, the tension was so thick that a pin could be heard dropping.

"She's meeting men online and setting them up to be raped," Olivia realized in horror, "but why?"

"And by who?" Elliot added.

* * *

"So this wasn't personal," Voight said, "Casey was just an opportune victim."

"But we still don't know what her motive is," Olivia said, "the victims weren't robbed, she never solicited anything from them, what does she have to gain from this?"

"Same thing male rapists do," Huang answered as he entered the squad room, "Power."

"Hank Voight, this is our psychiatrist from the FBI, Dr. George Huang," Elliot made the introductions.

"I've heard about you," Voight said as he shook the man's hand.

"And your reputation precedes you, Sergeant," Huang said with a stone face and an unreadable tone.

"Any idea what we're looking at here, doc?" Cragen wanted to know.

"A general impression, Dahlia Meehan was likely a victim of abuse early on in life, given her choice of victims obviously it was by men, maybe someone close to her, maybe a family member or a friend of the family," Huang explained, "Like all rapists, she projects her own past feelings of helplessness onto unsuspecting victims who she can exert control over and make them feel as powerless as she was."

"But Casey was definitely raped by a man," Fin pointed out.

"She doesn't have to have sex with him against his will, she already has the mindset of a rapist, she orchestrates the attacks," Huang told the detectives, "It's no different than somebody plotting a murder and then getting someone else to carry it out, under the law they're both equally guilty, but technically, the mastermind who puts it all in motion shares the bigger half of the liability, without their plans _to_ attack somebody, nothing happens."

"Any idea who she's working with?" Olivia asked.

"It's a stab in the dark without any further information," Huang said, "it could be a boyfriend who shares this rape fantasy with her or it could even be someone from her family. What do we know about her?"

"Still getting to that," Olivia read the printout she had so far, "Dahlia Meehan is 35 years old, she was raised on Staten Island with her parents, she has no siblings but in the extended family she does have three male cousins who are close in age to her."

"So it's possible this whole atrocity is a family affair," Munch suggested.

"It turns out she doesn't own the house we went to, she rents it," Olivia said, "her permanent address is an apartment in Midtown."

"But CSU said Casey was raped _in_ that vacant lot where he was found," Elliot said.

"Doesn't matter, odds are she's holed up in that apartment right now where she thinks nobody can find her," Cragen told them, "get over there and find out what's going on."

"And this time," Voight told the SVU detectives, "I'm coming."

* * *

"Police!" Elliot announced as they kicked the apartment door in and charged in with their guns drawn, "Get your hands up where we can see them!"

As they entered the apartment they were instantly met with the image of three very confused individuals, the woman they identified as Dahlia Meehan and two men who also looked to be in their 30s and each were well built and had tanned skin and short dark hair. The three of them moved frantically as they tried to decide whether to try to escape or to comply with the cops holding guns on them.

"Dahlia Meehan," Olivia said as she holstered her gun and took out her handcuffs, "You are under arrest for rape, assault-"

"What's your name?" Elliot asked one of the two men as he jerked the guy's wrists behind him.

"Ow!"

"What's your name!" Elliot repeated as he jerked tighter.

"Derrick, Derrick Fleming."

"Derrick Fleming, you're under arrest for rape, aggravated assault, battery-"

"Name," Voight said simply but firmly as he grabbed the other guy by his collar and got ready to bash his head into the wall.

"Damon Jones."

"Fine, you're under arrest," Voight said as he cuffed the man and hauled him out, "For rape, attempted murder, assault and battery, and anything else I can think of, I'm a cop," he stopped long enough to hit the man in the back of the head to make his point as he added, "I can do it. You have the right to remain silent, which will _not_ help you, you have the right to an attorney, who also will not be able to help you..."

* * *

"So exactly who are these two boneheads?" Cragen asked as he looked at the two men being held in separate interrogation rooms.

"Dahlia Meehan's boyfriends," Olivia said disgustedly.

Cragen did a slow double take, "Excuse me? As in plural?"

"These two geniuses seem to have the combined IQ of a lima bean," Munch explained, "So we're letting Huang take a crack at them first to get some idea what we're dealing with."

"And the ringleader Meehan?" Cragen asked.

"Hasn't lawyered up, but also not talking," Olivia said.

"I can fix that in five minutes," Voight offered.

"I'm sure you can but we don't need another lawsuit against this department," Cragen told the Chicago cop.

"I didn't do anything," Voight insisted nonchalantly.

"So, who breaks the news to Casey that we've got her?" Olivia asked.

"It's going to be hard for him to take as it is," Hank said, "I'll tell him." He took his phone out of his pocket and headed out of the room to make the call.

"We're still back to the original problem," Cragen told his detectives, "Nobody's going to press charges, nobody's going to testify, and I'm not seeing Casey carrying this whole thing alone."

Voight doubled back to the squad room and told everybody, "Casey's gone."

"What?" Olivia asked.

"He left Bellevue three hours ago," Hank answered.

Everybody was looking at one another as they grasped at what this meant.

"They could be anywhere by now," Elliot said.

"Either they hopped the first plane heading back to Chicago," Olivia said.

"Or they went back to the hotel," Voight added, "We'll check there first. Come on!"

* * *

Hank, Olivia and Elliot made their way up the stairs to the second floor of the hotel after they'd gotten the room number from the front desk and the man working there verified Casey and Severide had come in about three hours earlier. As they approached the room, they noticed the door was ajar and drew their guns.

"Matt? Kelly?" Olivia called out.

"In here," was Kelly's muffled response.

Olivia pushed the door open and the three cops cautiously entered and looked around. Right away they didn't see anyone, but the room was a mess, furniture had been turned over, the top covers were missing from the bed.

"Kelly? Are you guys okay?" Olivia asked.

After a small pause there was a hesitant answer, "_I_ am."

That got their attention and they moved into the bathroom, where they found Kelly half sprawled on the floor and half propped against the wall, and he had his arms wrapped around Casey, who for some reason was wrapped up in the comforter from the bed, he had his head resting against Kelly's shoulder and seemed to be barely conscious, though every breath he took emitted a small sob from his throat.

"What happened?" Olivia asked as they holstered their guns and assessed the situation.

"He got upset and became frantic...I was worried he'd hurt himself," Kelly lethargically answered, as if whatever had taken place in this room had drained all the strength out of him, "It was the only thing I could think of..."

"Why'd you leave the hospital?" Elliot asked as he and Voight slowly worked at unraveling the blanket to get a look at Casey and check him over for any injuries.

"Casey woke up a few hours ago, he didn't want to stay, the doctor cleared him, so we decided to come back here," Kelly answered as they pulled the blonde lieutenant off of him, he pressed his back tighter against the wall to sit up straighter as he explained, "He said he was going to take a shower...he didn't come out..I came in to make sure he was okay and found him on the floor..."

Casey softly moaned and weakly struggled against the two men who were touching him, but he also didn't seem to possess the energy or strength to truly fight anymore.

Kelly told Olivia, who crouched down beside him, "He ran out of the room and started hitting everything, screaming...kept saying he was an idiot, he was stupid...I didn't know what was happening so I grabbed the bedspread and I tackled him...somehow we wound up back in here...he finally told me, everything..." he shook his head, "I don't even remember how long ago that was."

"Are you hurt?" Olivia asked.

Kelly seemed a bit dazed but he shook his head, "Nah...I'm fine." With a grunt, he slowly got to his feet. "But what about Casey?"

"No sign of any injuries," Elliot concluded, "but we should probably get a bus here to look at him anyway."

"You can't take him back to the hospital," Kelly said, "he hated it there."

"Whoa, hold up," Olivia said as she spotted something. She hooked the tip of her finger under the collar of Kelly's T-shirt and pulled it down to reveal a large bruise just under Kelly's collarbone. With the light from the bathroom she saw more bruises that traveled down his body.

"Casey did that to you?" she asked in disbelief.

"Last night when they called 911," Kelly answered, and was adamant, "it was an accident, he didn't know what he was doing."

Olivia nodded, "I know."

Their conversation was broken up by the sound of Elliot and Voight pulling Casey to his feet. The blonde lieutenant looked like the bones in his body had turned to jelly and Olivia half expected him to fall right back down, but somehow he stayed on his feet, for a few seconds anyway before he collapsed on the edge of the tub.

In a low voice Kelly confided in Olivia, "I don't know what to do, I've never seen him like this. Casey's not the kind of guy who runs from anything, he always meets the threat head-on."

"Yeah," Voight spoke up from the other side of the room and pointed to himself, "Look at me."

"This is different, Kelly," Olivia told him.

He looked at her and somberly nodded, "I know...but I don't know how to help him."

A sound cut through the room that had all of them looking around, trying to identify it. The second time they realized it was coming from Matt Casey himself. The Truck lieutenant looked down at the floor as one knee started shaking, and a series of incoherent sounds escaped him before he started crying and dropped his head to his chest.

Kelly moved to go to him but Olivia grabbed him to get his attention.

Voight slowly walked over to the tub and looked at Casey, then sat down on the edge beside him and put an arm around the younger man's shoulders and calmly told him, "It's alright, Matt, it's over, we got them."

* * *

"I can't do this."

It took a long time for Casey to finally calm down, and longer still before he got his voice back instead of every breath coming back out as a sob before a word could form. Outside it was starting to get dark, everybody stood around the hotel room waiting to see what he was going to do.

"I can't go through with this," Casey told them. "I can't go to court, I won't testify, I can't do it, I won't, I'm sorry, I just can't."

Kelly had seen this coming, so he didn't feel too surprised, but he couldn't tell whether he was the only one who felt that way or not.

"Matt," Olivia broke the awkward silence, "You didn't do anything wrong-"

"I _know that_," he snapped at her. After a few seconds he added in a more normal tone, "But I'm not going to have what happened to me, and my whole private life drudged up in front of a jury, be made a matter of public record for anybody to read through."

"There are other victims, Matt."

"And are any of _them_ going to testify?" he asked. He shook his head, already knowing the answer. "You know what? They win," he laughed once, darkly, no humor to it whatsoever, "They win...they win, I lose, I go back to Chicago and I die alone...and they..." he squeezed his eyes shut and his face twisted into a sardonic smile as he looked at them again and forced himself to continue through the tears building in his eyes and audible in his throat, "they get to walk away Scot-free, I don't care..."

"Casey," Kelly reached a hand out to grip his friend's arm, but Casey stepped back just out of his reach.

"I don't care," Matt weakly repeated, "I just want to go home, I want to get out of here...I wish I'd never come."

Olivia and Elliot looked at each other and considered their options. Olivia turned and exchanged a glance with Voight as well, who stood back and said nothing, just waited to see what card they played.

"Matt," Elliot cleared his throat, "under the law we can hold them for 24 hours before we have to charge them."

"I'm not pressing charges," the firefighter told them.

"You may not have to," Olivia said. "While we're holding them we can dig further into their past and see if there are any other crimes that we _can_ charge them with, if so, we still get them off the street and you don't have to give a statement...sound fair enough?"

"You don't need me for that then," Casey said, "then I can leave."

"Actually, we need you to stay here until the 24 hours is up just to make sure," Elliot told him. "The clock's ticking, nobody at our squad's going home tonight, we're going to dig through their whole life history to find something we can nail them with, Voight, you in?"

"Hell yeah," Hank answered in a mostly nonchalant tone. He turned to the dark haired lieutenant and told him, "Severide, you stay with Casey until you hear from me."

Kelly nodded in response.

Casey reached over and grabbed Kelly's arm and half whispered in his ear, "Kelly, please, I don't want to stay here."

Kelly saw the cops leaving and he turned and murmured to Casey, "Wait here, I'll be right back." He followed them out of the room and met them in the hall.

"Don't charge them, just let the bastards go and give me five minutes with them," Kelly told them.

"See that?" Voight asked, "That's why Casey didn't tell you in the first place."

"But he _did_ tell me," Kelly replied, "he told me everything...that bitch, she _watched_."

"What?" Olivia asked.

Kelly's face looked like he wanted to strangle somebody, he stared them dead in the eyes and told them, "She wanted to go for a walk, so they did, and when they got to that lot the two sons of bitches jumped him, and she just stood there _watching_ while they raped him...she _told_ them to do it." The desperation was plain in his eyes as he begged the detectives, "Please...tell me she's _not_ going to get away with this."


	12. Chapter 12

"Okay, change of plans," Olivia said when she, Elliot and Voight returned to the squad room, "we need to find anything we can to charge these three with that doesn't require a victim's testimony."

Elliot saw Huang was still there and asked him, "What's the diagnosis?"

"Do you want the clinical term for it or the layman's term?" George asked.

"Let's go with the one a bunch of tired, borderline burnt out cops can easily comprehend," Munch suggested.

"Okay," Huang cut to the chase, "basically...Dahlia Meehan is emotionally dead, and Derrick and Damon both are borderline."

"Borderline what?" Elliot asked.

"My guess is they both have an IQ somewhere around 80, they're able to function but they are very easy to deceive, to manipulate, they don't possess the critical thinking skills to know when they're being taken advantage of, so it doesn't occur to them to question anything Dahlia says."

"How'd they get hooked up with her in the first place?" Fin asked.

"She's a true sociopath in every sense of the word, she's very charming, very charismatic, and she can convince almost anybody of anything she wants. She knows how to read people and she knows who she can string along and she seeks them out, both online and in real life."

"Sounds like a cult," Fin said.

"With a little tweaking, that's exactly what we'd be looking at," Huang explained, "Back in the late 80s, two women who worked at a nursing home in Michigan were arrested for murdering five elderly patients. The woman who masterminded the killings blamed her lesbian lover, and she was so convincing, the girlfriend got five life sentences, while she only got 40 years and was eligible for parole. She could make anybody believe anything she wanted, and she had the entire staff of the nursing home wrapped around her finger, they would do anything she wanted them to, even dance naked in the street. She would turn the women against each other and get a whole pack to gang up on another one and beat her to a pulp, and they firmly believed the victim deserved it because," he shrugged, "She said so, and anything she said must be true."

"But what does Dahlia gain from this?" Olivia wanted to know.

"Satisfaction, proof she can get anyone to do what she wants, that she has that power, and she can make anybody suffer she chooses to, because nobody but her matters," Huang said, "Even Derrick and Damon don't matter, they're just a means to an end, she probably had others before them, and when she finally gets bored with them there will no doubt be others."

"Okay but so," Olivia asked, "Are these guys competent?"

"Yes," Huang answered simply, "they know what they did is wrong, but in their mind it doesn't matter because it's what Dahlia wanted."

"And what Dahlia wants, she gets," Elliot said, "So how do we crack these three nuts?"

"Start with the guys," Huang told them, "They're eager to please, they'd do anything Dahlia wanted...use that to your advantage."

* * *

"You know you have the right to a lawyer, and if you get one, that means we can't talk to you anymore, but that also means we can't help you, or Dahlia, if that happens," Olivia told Damon as she and Elliot sat across from the young man.

He looked at them shiftily and asked, "What about Dahlia?"

"She's not getting a lawyer either, she's telling us everything," Elliot answered, "And the only way you can really help her out, is if you and Derrick also tell us everything too...because if we get different stories from the three of you, then that means trouble."

"And trouble for Dahlia," Olivia added, "you don't want her to get in trouble, do you?"

"No," he shook his head, "So what do I do?"

"We just need you to tell us everything that you guys did to Matt Casey."

"Who?"

"The man you raped and left in a vacant lot and then tossed his clothes and phone into a dumpster," Olivia answered.

Damon looked confused. "Which one was that?"

Elliot raised his eyebrows, "There was more than one?"

"Yeah, do I need to tell about all of them?"

"Actually, yeah, that would be great," Olivia said, "that would really help. Have there been a lot?"

"Some," Damon shrugged as he took the pad and pen from Elliot and started to write.

"Damon, there's just one thing I don't understand," Olivia told him, "why did you and Derrick do this?"

He looked at them and answered simply, "Because Dahlia asked us to."

"Did she ask you to, or did she _tell_ you to?" Elliot asked.

He shrugged again, "She said 'If you love me, you'll do this'."

"Did she say why?" Olivia asked him.

He shook his head, "Nah, she just said 'If you love me, you'll do this'."

"And you love her?" Elliot asked.

"Yeah."

"Does Derrick love her too?"

"I guess so."

"Does she love Derrick?" Olivia asked.

"I guess so."

"Does she love you?" she added.

"Yeah."

"How do you know?" Elliot asked.

Damon looked the cop in the eyes and answered without missing a beat, "She says she does."

The two cops exchanged a small look. Then Olivia saw he'd stopped writing.

"Is something wrong?" she asked.

"Do I just tell about the guys on the computer, or the others too?" Damon asked.

It took every ounce of self restraint both detectives had not to spring up in their seats at that.

"What others?" Elliot asked.

"The guys Dahlia met before the ones on the computer."

"When was that?" Olivia asked.

"I don't know, a year ago maybe," Damon answered.

"Why'd she start meeting them online instead?" Elliot asked.

"She said it was safer that way. After the last one died..."

"Wait, _what_ happened?" Olivia asked him.

He looked at them and said with no emotion in his voice whatsoever, "The last time Dahlia brought a guy back, she went out to a bar to find him."

"How'd he die?" Elliot asked, pretending it wasn't killing him to get the answer.

"When we got done with him, Derrick picked up a brick and hit him in the head...he made a gurgling noise, then he dropped, and he didn't get back up," Damon answered.

"What happened after that?" Olivia forced herself to maintain a calm tone.

"Dahlia said get rid of him, so we dumped him in an alley by some garbage cans...she said it'd be safer to find the next one on the computer, get somebody to come from another state, so if he died, there wouldn't be anybody looking for him who could find out about us," Damon answered.

* * *

"How'd you do?" Olivia asked as Fin and Munch came out of the other interrogation room.

"Almost word for word what your guy said, except Derrick cops to beating the guy's head in," Fin answered.

"This would have to be an open homicide, how did we not draw a comparison to this case when we were looking for similar M.O.?" Munch wanted to know.

"I don't know but we've got a full confession," Olivia said. "All we have to do now is find out who the dead vic is and we've got them."

"Yeah, but there's still one member of this gang to deal with," Elliot pointed to the two-way mirror in the interrogation room Dahlia was seated in, looking bored out of her mind.

* * *

"The game's up, Dahlia," Olivia said as she and Elliot entered the room.

The woman at the table folded her arms and looked annoyed, "What's this about?"

"You don't know?" Elliot asked. "That's surprising, seeing as how you're the one who orchestrated this whole thing."

"I don't know what you're talking about," she said, sounding put off by the whole thing.

"Dahlia, it's over," Olivia said, "We know about all the men you set up to be raped and beaten."

The woman actually smirked, "Oh please, none of them are going to testify against me, and you can't make a case without a complaining witness."

Elliot looked to Olivia and commented, "She's good."

"I'm not stupid," Dahlia told them, "I know what I'm doing."

"Yeah, we see that, you got those guys out there trained like a couple of lapdogs," Elliot noted, "They'd do anything for you."

"Why not? I'm hot," she said bluntly.

"Sure couldn't tell it by these photos though," Olivia said as she dumped Dahlia's profile pictures on the table in front of her. "To the unsuspecting eye you almost look innocent. It's really odd that you'd go to all this trouble to meet all these men, and never once ask them for any money, or anything. Hell, you never even took money out of the wallets when you tossed them."

"What would be the point of that?" Dahlia asked. "I don't need money."

"But it'd sure be easier to hook onto a sugar daddy or ten instead of spending months pretending you're actually a wholesome girl looking for romance," Elliot commented. "Seems like a waste of time to me."

"That's what you think," she replied. She leaned back in the chair and kicked her heels up onto the table and laughed as she looked at the detectives one by one, and added, "They were all so thrilled to meet a woman who didn't want money, or gifts, who didn't outright ask what they did for a living or how much money they made, who wasn't just looking for quick sex, they were all so relieved to find a real person and not just some gold digger...it was too damn easy."

"What was?" Olivia asked.

"How pathetic they all were," Dahlia answered, "Every single last one of them, they were dumb enough to believe somebody actually loved them...so stupid they thought somebody actually wanted to hear about their life and get to know them as people...it was like shooting fish in a barrel." She was openly laughing now as she continued, "The looks on their faces when they realized what was going on...and all of them...every last one, it never failed, they all just looked at me with this...hurt dog look, like...how could I?" Her smile tightened and pushed its way higher on her face as she giggled, "It's no wonder they'll never testify, have everybody know how stupid they were that they actually believed anyone wanted them? And instead they just walked straight ahead into the trap. It's hilarious."

"What happened with Matt Casey?" Elliot asked as he slammed a copy of Casey's profile picture on the table.

Dahlia picked it up in one hand and gazed at it with an amused look on her face, "Matt...Matt-Matt-Matt..." she giggled again, "He called when his plane landed...he took a cab to my house...we spent an hour talking...had dinner...had a few drinks, talked some more...he'd gotten some condoms 'just in case' but the poor son of a bitch fell asleep before it got that far...he'd told me about his dead fiancee and how he hadn't been with a woman since then, he was especially pathetic."

"How so?" Olivia asked.

Dahlia snorted, "All he did that night was talk, oh, he'd come ready for anything, but he forgot the condoms, he was too embarrassed to have that come up in the airport x-ray, we stopped at a drugstore so he could pick up a box...then the dumbass never even used them, he asked if we could just lay together in bed the first night," she sneered as the words came out, "he was more pathetic than a 16 year old virgin."

"So what happened?" Elliot asked.

Dahlia adjusted in her chair and explained, "He was so love-struck the next morning it was sickening, he wanted to wait until that night to have sex, thought it would be more meaningful if we were together another day before it happened...and that night after dinner, I told him 'let's go for a walk and when we come back it'll be so memorable'."

"And Derrick and Damon were already at the lot waiting," Olivia said.

"I'd told them where to wait for us, when they came out of the shadows he thought he was going to protect me...and when they grabbed him and he saw me, then it all just..._clicked_," the woman spoke slowly for dramatic effect, and she laughed, "That look on his face was priceless. He screamed but, nobody comes around that block at that time of night, that's where we took most of them, when it was over they had a good chance to work their way back home and have to explain what happened to them, their clothes, their wallets, it's hilarious really."

Elliot grinned cynically at her, and responded in a patronizing tone, "Well the gag's on you...Damon told us about the guy you killed, we identified the body, and there's no statute of limitations on murder."

"And since he was killed in the commission of a rape," Olivia said, "that's murder 1. All three of you are going to rot in prison with no parole."

"The DA gets a murder 1 conviction without a single victim having to testify, sounds like a win to me," Elliot said.

Dahlia tipped her chair to the front and put her feet on the floor, the smile on her face dropped after a second, but the expression that replaced it wasn't one typical of a perp who realized they were caught. Instead it just looked like minor annoyance.

She grunted a sinister laugh before she told the detectives, "You think I care? You're both idiots. You don't get it, do you?" She was beaming from ear to ear as she said proudly, "It doesn't matter what you or the courts or anyone does to me, because there's _nothing_ you can do that can compare to what I did to _them_. They'll go home and spend the rest of their lives remembering what happened to them, and they'll pretend it didn't ruin their life, or that they weren't the dumbest people who ever lived, they might even be able to convince themselves for a while, but it'll always come flooding back to them, and there won't be a day that goes by that they don't remember me laughing at them as they were raped. I still win."

* * *

"Olivia," Voight came up to the detective when she left the interrogation room, "I'm starting to think Severide had the right idea."

"About what?" she asked.

"That woman's right, there's nothing in the conventional means of the justice system that can be done to her that can compare to what she put those men through...so give me two minutes alone in the supply closet with her and I'll be able to make her eat her words, among other things."

"Oh, believe me," Olivia said with a great weight in her voice, "I am sorely tempted. We've seen perps like this before, and it never gets any easier dealing with them when you know there's nothing inside them."

"Not exactly a happy ending," Voight said.

"Even when we win, we never get those," Olivia replied. "At least we've got enough to put all three of them away for the rest of their lives. But I'm not sure how much consolation that'll be for Matt."

"When we get done processing them, let's go give him the news," Voight said. "It can't hurt him any."

"So..." Olivia turned to him and asked, "Now what?"

Hank looked at her and answered, "Tomorrow we'll be going back to Chicago."

Olivia shook her head, "We just never get any time to ourselves."

"That's the price of this job," Voight told her, "_but_, there's always next time."

She smiled sadly at him and said, "I almost wish there wasn't a next time, it always means somebody's life has been ruined and we have to work the case."

"Well...that's what vacation days are for," Hank said.

She nodded, "I'll have to check into it..."

"Be honest, Olivia," Hank said, "after everything that's gone on the last few days, you wouldn't want to try it now anyway."

She shook her head, knowing any attempt they made at intimacy now would be drowned out by the confession they'd just heard. Even if the two of them were in a seasoned relationship that would be hard to deal with, but just new and starting out and seeing where this was even going to go, she didn't think they could get through the night if they tried.

"I just feel so bad for Matt," she said.

"I know," Voight responded, "I do too, but he's tough, he'll get through this."

"But she's right, he's _never_ going to forget what she did to him," Olivia said. "He's never going to forget what happened because he decided to take a chance on falling in love again."

"I didn't say it would be easy," Hank replied, "but we do have a good psychiatrist on staff at Med who can help him work through this, _if_ he's willing to try it."

* * *

By the time Olivia, Elliot and Voight returned to Casey and Severide's hotel room, it was late, and it looked like Casey had been asleep or at least tried to, he sat at the head of one of the double beds with his knees bent and was dressed in a pair of plaid pajama pants and a T-shirt, his short hair was spiked in parts from laying against the pillows, and though his eyes were fairly wide open, he looked ready to drop from exhaustion as the cops gave the two firemen the news. Kelly was still dressed and sat at the foot of the same bed, listening to the same information.

"The DA can build an entire case against them for murder one without having to bring any of the other attacks into the equation, they'll be convicted without a single victim testifying," Elliot explained, "And she'll push for the highest sentence, they're never going to get out. It's over."

Matt slowly turned his head down and his eyes all but closed, he pressed his hands over his eyes and groaned as if in disbelief of the whole thing. Then suddenly a small sob broke through instead, and once one got out, it opened the floodgate for others as his chest started heaving in time with his frantic breaths. Kelly turned where he sat and moved to put his hand on Casey, but Voight wordlessly intercepted him and stood between the two firemen.

"Severide, you look like you could use a drink, why don't you go down to the bar with the detectives, and I'll stay with Casey till you get back."

Kelly didn't want to leave Matt alone with Voight, but he could sense there was a reason Hank was sending him out of the room. He looked over at the SVU detectives and silently complied. He stood up from the bed, but before he left he put his hand on Casey's shoulder and told the blonde man, "I'll be back in a few minutes, I won't be gone long, I promise."

Reluctantly, he followed Olivia and Elliot out of the room. After the door closed behind them, Hank turned to the Truck lieutenant and told him softly, "Move over."

Casey realized what he was saying and scooted over on the bed so Voight could sit down.

Hank looked at the younger man and said to him, "Matt, I am very sorry about what you were put through, but I know you're strong enough to get through this, you survived me." He'd hoped that that comment would get some small response from the fireman, but there was nothing.

"Matt, look at me. Come on, look at me."

Casey picked his head up and opened his eyes and saw Voight reach into his jacket pocket and he took out a cell phone with a cracked screen on it.

"This is the condition it was in when the cops found it," Hank said as he held it out to Matt, "You should be able to transfer your stuff onto a new one."

Casey took the phone and looked at it almost in awe, then he looked at Voight and asked him, "How'd you get it?"

"I convinced the techs that since there wasn't going to be a trial, officially there was no case, and with no case, this was no longer evidence, and since it's not evidence, there was no point in them holding onto it," Voight explained.

"How'd you do that?" Casey asked.

"I have my ways," he answered.

Casey looked back down at the phone and he asked Voight, "You know, don't you? You read the messages."

"Yeah, I'm sorry, we had to," Hank told him.

Casey nodded his head, "I get it..." his voice was just barely strong enough to hold the words together without sobbing again, but they threatened to spill over with every few breaths he took. "I was an idiot...I really thought I'd found someone..."

Voight shook his head, "No, listen to me, Matt, you didn't do anything wrong, there was no way you could've known what she was really like. We looked through everything, and it took us forever to figure it out, there were no red flags, you didn't rush into anything, you did everything right, there wasn't any way you could've seen this coming."

Casey half closed his eyes, his voice was full of self-disgust, "Something's wrong with me."

"No...Matt, I am sorry about what happened to Hallie...trust me, I know how painful it is to lose the woman you thought you'd spend your whole life with. It's hard, and it's hard knowing when the time's right to try and find someone else. Matt, this is in no way a punishment for trying to move on and find someone new."

Casey looked down at the bedding and quietly said, "It sure feels like it."

"Hallie would never have wanted this to happen to you, you can't think like that," Hank told the younger man hugging his knees to his chest, "You weren't the only one they did this to, Matt, they knew what they were doing, everybody they targeted were upstanding guys who were just tired of being alone with no ulterior motives."

"And we all fell for it," Casey said in a voice slightly shaking, "It doesn't say much for us."

"Recovering from this won't be easy and I'm not going to pretend it is," Hank said, "but you're going to have to talk to _somebody_ about it, Matt, and if you don't want it to be Severide, that's fine, and if you don't want to tell _me_ about it, that's fine, but I've seen a lot of stuff on this job, Matt, I think I'm better qualified than most to hear it...you ever decide you want to talk about it, or _not_," Voight took a card out of his pocket and handed it to Casey, who saw it had Voight's name and phone number on it, "You know where to find me."

Casey looked at the card, his vision was blurry from new tears building up, he blinked and he felt them rolling down his face. He looked at the cop and quietly said, "Thanks, Hank."

A newfound look of horror formed on his face as he realized, "What am I going to do now? What do I tell everyone? How do I explain this?"

"You don't have to," Hank answered. "I took care of that."

* * *

"I just don't get it," Kelly said as he and Liv and Elliot sat in the hotel bar. The detectives were officially off duty but both had refrained from joining Kelly in a beer. He looked at the two cops and said, "I get why Casey wouldn't say anything about the attack...but why didn't he tell us he was coming out here? Why would he keep it a secret he was meeting someone? All this time, I thought he must've gotten into something illegal he couldn't talk about."

"We had our own theories that didn't exactly pan out," Elliot said.

"Was it true that Casey hasn't been with a woman since Hallie died?" Olivia asked.

"He's had a couple dates since then, but nothing ever came of them, they were over pretty quickly," Kelly answered. "This just doesn't make sense, he was talking to this woman every day, and he never told us, never told anybody, why?"

"Kelly," Olivia glanced down at the counter before looking the fireman in the eyes as she said simply, "Not everything done in the dark is shameful. We went through all their chats, he was really excited about meeting Dahlia...I think he was scared to get his hopes up incase it didn't work out."

Kelly squinted uncomfortably, "You read all that?"

"Part of the job, unfortunately when we get involved, people don't have secrets anymore," Elliot said. "If a victim for any reason conceals any details about anything from their attack, the defense can use it against them as 'proof' they're lying."

He nodded, equally uncomfortably, "No wonder he didn't want to report what happened." He took a swig of his beer and swallowed it hard and asked them, "So now what? What do I do?"

"You got him through the worst of it," Elliot said. "As long as you got his back, he'll be fine."

"What do I tell everybody at 51 when we get back?" Kelly asked.

"What have you told them already?" Olivia asked.

"Not much, I can't tell them about this, after I got here I called our battalion chief and told him that Casey was in the hospital, and since the cops were investigating I couldn't say much because we didn't know if it was a direct target on 51 and the investigation could be compromised if word got out."

"That was fast on your feet," Elliot noted.

"Yeah, but now that it's all over, they're going to want to know what's been going on, what do I tell them?" Kelly asked helplessly.

"You could try the truth," Olivia said.

Kelly shook his head, "That would not work."

"Well it doesn't have to be the whole truth," Elliot pointed out, "For example, you tell them that Casey got catfished and came to New York to meet who he thought was a single woman looking for a relationship, and instead it turned out to be two guys who beat and robbed him."

"They didn't rob Casey," Kelly said.

"They took his wallet, they took his phone, what they actually did with them is irrelevant, they forcefully took them from Casey after they beat him up, that still counts as robbery."

Kelly thought about it and nodded hesitantly, "I guess that could work." He looked back and forth at the two detectives and asked, "You two've been doing this a long time...is Casey gonna be okay?"

"Well, life never goes back to normal for any victim," Elliot said, "but...yeah, I think he will. A big question, had this gone to trial, and Casey had to come back here and testify, and the defense and DA both draw out every gory detail about what happened, and the defense tries to say Casey knew what he was getting into and asks some very leading questions that could even make it start to look that way...would you still be here supporting him?"

"What kind of question is that?" Kelly asked. "He's my best friend, of _course_ I would."

"There you go," Elliot replied.

"You know, Kelly," Olivia said, "I've sat with a lot of victims in court, and a lot of times their families and their friends _think_ they can take what comes out during the trial...and a lot of times they can't, by the end of the trial I'm the only one there for the victim because everything drudged up is worse than they could've imagined."

Kelly shook his head, "Not me, we've been through everything together, there's no way in hell I'd abandon him during this."

"That's _why_ Matt's going to be alright," Olivia told the lieutenant, "because he has you."


	13. Chapter 13

A/N: Here we are at the last chapter finally. Thank you all for reading and reviewing!

"Hey Casey," Kelly opened the door to their hotel room and stepped in with Olivia and Elliot right behind him, and all three froze right in the door at the sight before them.

Voight was sitting up on the bed with one arm draped over Casey's shoulders as he held the sleeping lieutenant against him, with his free hand he raised a warning finger for them to be quiet.

Kelly quietly moved over to the bed and carefully grabbed Casey to pull him back from Voight so he could get off the bed, and Severide eased Casey back down against the pillows, then followed the three cops out into the hall.

"What the hell happened?" Elliot asked.

Voight merely responded, "We found some common ground."

He turned to Kelly and told him, "Get that boy some Dramamine for tomorrow, we have a 5 o' clock flight out for Chicago tomorrow afternoon."

"What?" Kelly asked.

"We're going home," Voight said, emphasizing the words slowly.

Kelly blinked, "All three of us?"

"That surprises you?" Voight asked.

"Honestly? Yes."

"Kelly," Hank said, "it's over."

Kelly took a step back like the words actually hit him, as if the concept just now registered with him.

"It's all over," Hank said softly. "We're going home."

There was a silence between the four people for a minute, nobody knew what to say, and Kelly stumbled to not sound like a complete idiot as he said to Voight, "We got two beds in our room, you just wanna stay tonight?"

"Nah, I got a room in this city already," Hank answered. He and Olivia barely looked at each other, but the small glance they exchanged said it all.

* * *

"So, what do you want to do?" Olivia asked as she locked the door and took off her jacket.

"What do _you_ want to do?" Hank replied as he draped his jacket over a chair.

"It's your last night in New York, what do _you_ want to do?" Olivia asked as she made her way over towards the couch.

"Your city, your rules," Voight said as he followed her over, "What do _you_ want to do?"

"How about this?" with an exhausted sigh, Olivia fell back against the cushions.

"Sounds like a plan," Hank replied as he seated himself beside her.

"What a day," Olivia groaned.

"Mm-hm," Voight grunted.

"Matt Casey is never going to trust a woman again," Olivia said.

"Probably not," Voight reluctantly agreed. "It's too bad, everyone deserves a second chance at happiness."

Olivia turned her head to look at him and replied, "Or first."

The two cops looked a each other for a minute, neither saying anything. Without a word exchanged between them, Voight put his arm around Olivia and pulled her to lean against him, and Olivia reached for the remote and turned on the TV.

* * *

Kelly lay in his bed trying to sleep but he couldn't. He wasn't sure why, but even though he was tired he just couldn't get to sleep. Maybe it was the adrenaline from everything finally being over, or maybe because even now he couldn't stop worrying about Casey, but he continued to toss and turn and hoped he'd eventually find the right spot and be able to nod off.

But from the other side of the room he could hear Matt tossing and turning every so often as well, then finally...

"Kelly..."

He turned over and looked across to the other bed, "You okay?"

"I don't know," Casey answered.

There wasn't anything in the way Casey said it that gave Kelly the impression something was pertinently wrong, just in general.

"You want me to come over there?" he offered.

"No," Casey said.

Kelly thought for a minute, and asked, "You want to come over here?"

There was only silence from the other side of the room, then he heard Casey throw the covers back and get up from the bed. Kelly moved over and pulled the covers down as Casey climbed in and sat beside him. Kelly sat up and put his arm around Casey and held his friend close, with his other hand he fumbled for the remote control and turned on the TV. They saw up, bleary eyed, watching reruns of old black and white shows until they both fell asleep about 3:30 in the morning.

* * *

"So, you're sure it's all over?" Casey asked the next day when he and Severide stopped in at SVU to make sure there were no loose ends to take care of before they went back home. "I don't have to sign anything or make any kind of statement?"

"Nope, they were all arraigned today, remanded without bail," Olivia said. "Derrick and Damon are going to allocute, Dahlia will probably stand trial, but with two confessions both implicating her, the DA won't have any trouble connecting those dots."

"And when the case becomes public it may give some of the other victims the nudge to come forth and press charges for their own assaults," Elliot added. "Even if it doesn't, they are going to see her picture in the paper and know she finally got caught, and even if they don't face her in court themselves there should be some closure from knowing she's going to rot in prison for the rest of her life and can't do it to anyone else again."

Casey looked towards the floor and nodded, "Great...that's great..."

"It _will_ get better, Matt," Olivia said, "you just have to be patient."

"I know," he looked up again, "I know..."

"You okay?" Elliot asked.

Casey nodded, "I got a head start on the Dramamine, the flight out here was...I _thought_ at the time, the worst experience of my life...by the time we take off I don't want to be aware of anything."

"That'll get easier too," Olivia said.

"Um..." Casey was clearly struggling with what he wanted to tell the detectives, "I...I just...I wanted to say thank you, for...everything..."

"We were just doing our job," Elliot said.

Casey let out a small laugh, "That's the line _I_ use." He looked at the four detectives and added, "We always have a saying, that when everybody else runs out, we're running in, and when you see us, it's usually the worst day of your life...apparently that's true here too."

Munch broke the silence that had followed with, "Makes for some interesting acquaintances though, doesn't it?"

It was so random and took everybody by surprise, that Casey busted out laughing, so did Severide.

Voight entered the squad room and told the lieutenants, "The cab's here, we gotta get going if we're gonna make the flight."

"Sergeant Voight," Olivia said, all business again, "it was nice working with you. Thanks for coming out and helping us."

He took her hand and shook it and said in response, "Thanks for having me."

* * *

Elliot saw Olivia as she watched the three men leave the precinct.

"Liv, you okay?" he asked.

Olivia blinked, "It's just so sad what happened to Matt, the guy is so alone that he comes a thousand miles just to find somebody who loves him...and instead he's beaten, raped, humiliated, nearly killed."

"Hey," Elliot nudged her and nodded his head to the three mean walking out of the precinct.

Olivia turned and looked. The three men had their backs to the cops, Voight and Severide stood on either side of Casey and each had an arm slipped behind his back.

"Might not be what he had in mind," Elliot said, "but I think he found it anyway."

* * *

It was a fairly quiet and uneventful flight back to Chicago, most of the seats were vacant. Voight had gotten them three aisle seats together, a little cramped but not a real problem. Casey had been starting to feel the effects of the air sickness pills long before they took off, but he was still tense when the plane started moving, and didn't calm down until a few minutes after they'd left the ground and he was convinced it would actually be smooth sailing from there. Now, half an hour into the flight, Severide and Voight both felt the man seated between them go limp, they turned and saw Casey was passed out cold in his seat with his head falling to his chest. The Intelligence sergeant and the Squad lieutenant exchanged a look, neither said anything, they both looked at Casey, Voight placed a hand on Matt's shoulder and Kelly reached over and placed one hand on the back of Casey's head and softly massaged it. Both men had been mortified at what Casey had been put through in New York, and both knew he was anxious to get home and attempt to put his life back together like it used to be, and try to put all of this behind him. And they were both equally anxious to get him back home so that could start to happen.

* * *

Casey woke up as they plane landed, but he was still groggy and he wasn't fully awake and alert until they were in a cab leaving the airport. Nobody talked during the drive but the three men in the backseat felt plenty awkward for Severide and he could just imagine it was for Casey too.

He looked out the window and furrowed his eyebrows together when they stopped. "What're we doing at the 21st?"

"I have a couple things to tend to," Voight answered, "Come on in, we'll get another cab to leave."

The two firefighters looked at each other and shrugged mutually, and did as they were told.

It was already pitch dark out and the bright lights of the district were a sharp contrast, Casey blinked several times when they stepped in. They followed Voight up the stairs to the front desk and he told them, "Stay here, I'll be down in a few minutes."

Casey leaned over and asked Severide, "We listening to him now?"

"I'm trying to figure out how we got stuck riding with him," Kelly responded.

* * *

"So where's my truck?" Casey asked as they left the men's room.

"When Voight called me, I had Tony come get it and take it back to your apartment," Kelly answered.

"Does everybody know?" Casey asked.

"I ain't told them anything," Kelly said, "but I got an idea how to explain it without anyone finding out what really happened."

"Good."

As they headed back to the front, their conversation was interrupted by the brash voice of Trudy Platt behind them as she called out, "Lieutenant Casey."

The two firemen looked at each other and both turned around to see the desk sergeant glaring at them.

"Yeah, Trudy?" Casey asked, completely clueless.

Trudy stepped out from behind her desk, walked over to the two men and the next thing Casey knew...

"Geh!" Casey's eyes bulged to twice their size, as did Kelly's, though his were in surprise at the sight before him of Trudy hugging Casey so tightly against her that she was choking the life out of him.

"I am so sorry for what you were put through," she said in a half quiet tone so nobody outside of the three of them could overhear.

"Uh...thanks, Trudy," Casey gasped, then he nudged her shoulder to get her attention, "Trudy...I can't breathe."

"Oh," the desk sergeant pulled back and Casey nosily inhaled, the gray haired woman slightly winced as she added, "Sorry."

"Uh, Trudy," Casey pulled at his collar, "Does...does Mouch, or...anybody else, know about this?"

Trudy shook her head, "You have nothing to worry about there."

Casey grimly nodded, "Thanks."

Trudy turned and Kelly immediately took a step back, for fear she might try squeezing the life out of him too.

"Good to have you guys back, Severide," Trudy said, "your men from 51 have been here every day asking for updates."

Kelly nodded, "I'll get it straightened out."

"Appreciate it," she replied as she went back to her desk, back to her all business no-nonsense self.

Voight came down the stairs and told the firemen, "Okay, let's go. Where am I dropping you two off?"

"Actually we can just-" Kelly started to say.

"Nope," Voight cut him off, "I'm seeing you two home, the question is _whose_ home?"

Kelly looked at Casey and started to ask him, "What do-"

Casey shook his head, "It's fine."

"My place is closer," Kelly said, "Casey can stay the night with me."

"Then it's settled," Voight said, "let's go."

* * *

Kelly locked the door, turned around and saw Casey standing in the middle of the living room with his arms pressed tight to his chest, looking completely lost.

"Casey?" he tried to get the blonde man's attention, "You okay?"

Casey let out a shaky breath and slowly answered, "I don't know."

Severide had expected something to happen once they finally got home, but he wasn't sure what to expect.

"You want to get something to eat?" he asked.

Casey just barely shook his head, "No."

"You want a beer?"

"No."

"You want to get cleaned up?"

Casey shook his head. "I feel...like a zombie...like I'm empty..." he let out a small nervous laugh as he added, "I'd probably feel like crying if I thought it would do any good, but I feel like there's just nothing left in me."

Kelly stepped over to him and closed the distance between them by hugging Matt tight.

"Give it time," he said. He thought, or hoped anyway, that after Casey got a few hours sleep he'd be able to look at everything in a new light and not feel like everything was completely hopeless. For that matter he hoped Casey would be _able_ to sleep.

"It's gonna get better," Kelly told him, hoping it wasn't a promise made in vain.

Casey sighed against him, "I know..."

Kelly tried to think but he was coming up empty. "Is there anything I can do?"

Casey was silent for a few seconds, then he let out a single, small, nervous laugh and said sheepishly, "Don't let go...not just yet..."

Kelly tipped his head back in a silent laugh, and slightly tightened his hold on Matt and told him, "I can do that."

* * *

"Hey, Hank," Olivia answered her phone, "Everybody get home okay?"

"Yeah, I just dropped Casey and Severide off for the night," Hank answered.

"Oh, wow," Olivia's eyes widened slightly, "That's surprisingly nice of you."

"I have my moments," he replied. "How're you?"

"Okay," she answered, after a small pause she said in a more honest tone, "Wish you were still here."

"Same, but, Chicago needs me," Voight said. "What about you?"

"I've been looking at my schedule and honestly I don't know when's a good time to cash in my vacation days," she answered.

"When the time's right, you'll know," Hank told her.

She smiled, then changed the subject, "How's Matt doing?"

"Glad to be back home, after that," Voight grunted, "It's anybody's guess."

"I hope he'll be alright," Olivia said.

"He'll be fine, he's a survivor," Voight remarked.

"And you seem very emotionally invested in his welfare," Olivia noted.

"As far as I'm concerned, anybody from 51, anybody does anything to them, they're automatically one of mine," he answered.

"So, if it had been Kelly that came out on that plane and we found in that lot," Olivia said.

"I would've still been out there on the first flight," Hank affirmed.

"And put as much effort into finding the people responsible."

"Damn straight."

"And the other night in the hotel room?" Olivia asked.

"What's your point, Olivia?" Hank sounded like he was about to laugh.

She shrugged, "Just wondering if maybe through some odd twist of fate, this might've brought you two closer together."

"Than _what_?" Now Voight was laughing.

Olivia smiled, "You really _have_ been like a father figure through all this."

"Oh knock it off."

"Actually," she added, "_more_ like one than a lot of biological fathers I've seen on this job."

"You stop it," Voight said, "now you're just being disgusting."

She laughed, then told him, "Matt's very lucky that you have his back."

"Not sure he'd see it that way," Hank replied.

"Oh...I think he knows, Hank," Olivia said.

"He's staying with Severide tonight."

Olivia nodded, "Probably a good idea, he seems to be about the only one that can get through to Matt."

"They've been through a lot together," Voight said.

* * *

Kelly quietly padded out of the bathroom and made his way through the living room to check on Casey. It was going on 2 o' clock in the morning, he'd been going in and out of sleep keeping an ear open for any noises from the living room incase Casey had a nightmare or another flashback. So far there'd been nothing. In the sparse light in the room he could see Casey laying face down on the couch with the side of his face buried in a pillow that he half clutched in his hands. He wasn't sure if Casey had moved from that position all night, but that's roughly how Matt had looked when Kelly covered him up and went to bed.

Except he finally realized that the blanket was gone. He looked and saw it pooled on the floor by the couch. Kelly picked it up and draped it back over Matt, who hardly moved but let out a soft contented sigh when the fabric touched his skin. Kelly also noticed that Casey stopped holding himself so stiff and instead half curled on his side under the covers.

He leaned over and calmly rubbed Casey on his back, realizing that Matt was completely out of it, and ever so thankful for it.

"Love you, buddy," he whispered as he tipped his head down and lightly kissed Casey on the crown of his head.


End file.
